Fingon Unplugged

Wed, 09 Feb 2005 13:13:46 GMT

ithilwen's been writing that story about me that she promised to a while back. Go on, hurry up, check out her LJ to read some of it. You won't be disappointed (although I am a bit of a wuss in that second bit). Love you, ithilwen!

Yes, I'm very much around, why do you ask?

That Time In The Woods

Thu, 14 Oct 2004 16:13:00 GMT

Leaving, but never far enough/like a ship caught in the bay/we'll show each other where it hurts/ and we'll make the fuckers pay.

- Some song she wanted written about.

So here is vague slash the girl wrote for that other girl a long time back, but never got around to posting because it is plotless, and has no excuse of major smut either. It is a mild R is all. And there's some but not much action-adventure that goes before.

Now someone must make a military Major Smut icon.

And of the other other girl I am most fond. She is my princess. Thank you for reading it.

It was terrible weather.

The end of winter made sky and earth turn varying shades of uncompromising grey. Everything was almost as ugly as Angband – life, the land, the situation, other people. Even Fingon was ugly. Strange but true. He was caged again in the ice that came over him intermittently, face hardened by frost, brown scars running the tough, unresponsive stretch of his skin. He drank a lot of rotgut – we all did, it was cold by any standards up in the North that year – and distanced himself from everyone, even me. Especially me, I think. We have these periods of unreasonable, stubborn silence between us. We are both stubborn elves. Usually one or both of us break the deadlock with a massive fight or a fervid lovemaking – a physical one. We have reverted to that since we came here, because it is easier.

I like making love with him. There is so much of me engraved into his body – every touch, every mark, every drop of blood that rushes up to his skin to meet my fingers – that now and again I think he is more myself than I am. I suppose it is the same with him. Sometimes we have to look to each other to know our own thoughts and feelings.

But we were running away that winters’ day, a small band of us out on reconnaissance. We had suddenly found ourselves being trailed by a company of orcs that seemed to grow every time we turned to spot them. Soon it seemed as though there were a hundred of them against nine of us – Fingon, I and seven of our soldiers. I should have made sure our numbers were greater. It seemed like a good idea to travel light when we were setting out. It was supposed to be a fairly simple, routine trip, more an excuse for us to go hunting than anything else. An inexcusable lack of foresight on my part, but I was tired. Both Fingon and Maglor had come dangerously close to death in the last year, one from a poisoned arrow, the other from a nasty cutlass wound, and the strain on my heart had been almost greater than I thought I could bear, even after all I have borne. I suffered a few terrible months torn between one worry and the other. At least I was able to look after Maglor. But Fingon I was seeing for the first time after his injury.

We had sent our horses ahead on a longer but less dangerous road to Aegnor’s fortress. With them had gone the tenth member of our company, an elf I knew only as Tiny, which was what everyone called him. He was ridiculously young, not yet sixty, with hair as black as any Noldo’s, but his skill with knives was already a legend in Hithlum. He had taken Fingon’s ring and gone ahead, and we hoped our message would reach them before the orcs caught up with us.

The forests were wet after months of leaf-fall and frost. It was difficult to climb through them, but we had all been in worse. Fingon hardly seemed to feel the chill, and his six had lived in forests for an age of the stars, I suppose. Morwen and I had to scramble now and then to keep up with them. It seemed we were bringing up the tail of the group, which was probably for the better. For a long time there had been no orc she or I had met who had managed to make so much as a scratch on our bodies. As much as people tended to marvel at my sole hand’s ability to inflict death, they marvelled more at her, until they got closer and saw that thing in her eyes that made them uncomfortable, even frightened. To Morwen it was all revenge, without the noble fetters of an oath like ours. Elves do not like women to be bloody-minded, and she was that.

No one knew whether she was a Sindë or an Avari, or indeed if her name was Morwen at all. I found her on a hunt in a wood not far from here, beaten senseless and left for dead. Orcs again. Fingon had been with me on that occasion as well. We took her to Himring and she survived, much to our benefit. Now she considers herself the guardian of my safety. I do not mind. She has a deadly competence with both sword and bow, and her night sight is better than all of Himring’s put together.

Fingon and I were the only Noldor in that little bunch, come to think of it. Those others were all Umanyar who had joined themselves to his army some time after they came to Mithrim. Many people wanted to join Fingon’s host. Word of his deeds had reached even the farthest corners of Beleriand. Like most Umanyar these six tended to be a great deal more silent than us, something which no doubt suited Fingon in his current state of mind. Still, no one could accuse them of being less skilled with their arms.

I watched Fingon as we climbed. We had hardly spoken on this trip. He refused to turn and look at me. I knew it would be unwise to try and probe into his mind. He was angry at me again. I was sorry, for we never do have much time to spend with each other, and every moment snatched for love was a luxury. We had kissed perfunctorily when he came to Himring, but nothing beyond that. I hoped we could mend ourselves once we got to safety – we were aiming to reach Aegnor’s halls in Dorthonion, not far from here. I wanted to see him and touch him, to reassure myself that he was unhurt, to love him once more.

The orcs were gaining ground. Behind me, Morwen uttered a curse and called up softly to the others to move faster. It was strange how rough their tongue sounded in times like these. We all sped up a little, and one elf, tall and pale-haired, sprang lightly up into the branches of the trees and ran along them.

We had covered ground fast, and we would reach Aegnor’s borders in some hours, provided we outran the orcs. That was a problem. I would be lying if I said I was unafraid. As the years passed the foul creatures had increased in skill. It was as though Morgoth’s own malevolent power was manifested in each of them. And as for this growing company that was trailing us, I had no doubt they were that sort. They followed some fashion of discipline (always a dangerous sign of intelligence in an orc) and seemed to fear neither daylight nor clear water.

No, I thought to myself. The only thing that would stop them now would be steel.

We reached the hilltop just as a pale, watery sun peeked through the clouds overhead. It was noon, and it would take till dusk to get to the nearest outpost of Aegnor’s lands. The thought was not encouraging in the least. We made for a dark copse of evergreens just ahead. The pale-haired elf jumped down lightly and walked beside me. I think he had suffered some kind of capture too – the skin down his left arm from neck to fingers was pockmarked hideously. He had not said a word in the course of this trip to anyone but Fingon. I had to laugh to think of the sight we must have been – nine people who had doubtless suffered most imaginable kinds of torture between them and lived to tell the tale – or keep silent for ever. Fingon steadfastly clammed up at any mention of the Helcaraxë. Years had passed, and every last thing I had heard about his ordeal came from lips other than his own. If I had had any time to regret all that had gone before, I might have regretted my weakness against Father at Losgar. But I did not, I could not, I was too busy fighting for my own life. It was the most I could do to forgive Fingon his fits of moodiness and shortness of temper (and a shorter temper than Fingon’s usual is saying something) now and then.

“This is wretched,” someone growled suddenly as we stopped to catch our breath in the copse. We had been running for three days.

It was a dark-haired Sinda, Taraen by name. Perfectly ordinary until he drew his sword. He was shrewd beyond his experience, and one of Fingon’s most valuable men.

Fingon said nothing. Last year’s arrow had caught him right in the stomach, and they could not get him to a healer fast enough to extricate the poison completely. It was why his scars had not healed after so much time. He leaned against a pine and tried not to screw up his face in pain. I thought I was the only one who noticed.

I made my way to his side and offered him my skin of water. He took it without touching my hand, drank deeply, and returned it without a word.

“Will we be safe?” he asked, not looking at me.

Morwen, in his line of vision, shook her head silently. She never wasted words unless she had to. Taraen said “No,”; two of the younger elves cursed before saying the same thing. The pale-haired elf remained quiet, and looked out down the slope.

Perhaps they sensed that he was not himself. Taraen turned to me and said, “Lord Maedhros, what do you think?”

I said, “If there were more of us we might have stayed and fought.”

That was my idea. It was not my place to order Fingon’s own friends and followers as I would my own, but I am not lord of Himring and my father’s son for nothing. I do not know if the thought had occurred to Fingon, or if he placed much faith in it, but it galled me to think of running away from an enemy we ought never to give the satisfaction of knowing that they have our fear.

I said, “They will be where we are standing now in four hours at the most, five or a little more if something stops them along the way. It will take us more than that from here to the first tower of Dorthonion.”

“You and he should go,” Morwen said to me, indicating Fingon. “They want you.”

That made Fingon smile. “They’ve been after us since we set foot here, Morwen. We have never yet been caught.”

She looked at me pointedly and said nothing.

“If we are staying to fight I am certainly not leaving you,” he said to the others.

“Nor I,” I added.

“Can we not cover the rest of the distance?” someone asked.

“No,” the pale-haired elf spoke for the first time since we began being chased. “They are gaining on us too fast.” He looked at Fingon. “We shan’t be able to run much longer, the way we are.”

Fingon scowled and said nothing.

“Then let us stay and fight,” I said.

“Morwen might go ahead,” Taraen suggested with misplaced gallantry.

She almost smiled as she shook her head. She would stay where I stayed.

We went a little further down the slope and came to a little clearing among the trees. It provided little hiding place for us, but the ground was firm and dry.

Fingon tested his bow. To familiar eyes his stiffness was barely noticeable. To mine it was obvious. I pulled him towards me and led him behind the fat trunk of a tree. The others were talking quietly amongst themselves.

“Look,” he began, “perhaps we should – “

I kissed his lips before he could finish his sentence. He almost gave in before he turned away.

“Don’t,” he said harshly. I kissed him again. He kissed back fiercely, briefly, before he jerked his head away.

I gathered him in my arms and nuzzled his neck. If he wanted to quarrel, these were my arguments. He sighed and sank back against the tree trunk. I was dimly conscious of the fear of being watched, but I trusted my instincts not to fail me; besides, Morwen would take care of things behind my back.

I kissed a small scratch on his throat, and he stroked my hair and held me closer. “Bad luck,” I said softly. It came out as a murmur against his skin. “Are you well?”

He shook his head and pushed me away. “No,” he said. “And I am sorry to have endangered the rest of you.”

He was talking nonsense. I pressed another kiss to his mouth, said “Later,” and let him go.

We rested on the slope as best as we could. We would need our strength if we were to do battle. Morwen reported that we had been spotted, and the orcs had paused momentarily to deal with this development. Perhaps they guessed that we would be backed up. A hundred orcs is not very much between twenty-five elf warriors on a normal day; on good days they are not much for ten. This was not a good day, though. We were tired and on foot. Had any mishap occurred to our horses or the small elf? Out of the corner of my eye I saw Fingon rub the flesh of his index finger, where the sapphire of Fingolfin had rested. He was thinking the same thing.

I wondered if we could do something to distract the orcs. Short of sacrificing one of us to meet them further down and cause a little skirmish, I could think of nothing else. We were not about to do that.

“They are more than a hundred,” Morwen said laconically. “A hundred and fifty. I think this was planned very well.”

The other Sindar cursed under their breath, sounding like orcs themselves. “Let them come,” one of them said irritably. “I’m not about to run now.”

Taraen laughed shortly, and took his sword – it was of Noldor make – in hand. I turned and looked down into Dorthonion to see if I could spot the golden armour of Aegnor’s men before turning ahead. Morwen gave her quiver of arrows to the pale-haired elf and came to stand at my right with her own sword. The others arranged themselves around and behind me; Fingon and the other elf climbed into the trees.

As the first of them came to the hilltop, Fingon raised his bow and cried his war-cry. It struck as much fear into the swarms of darkness as anything I have seen. To hear Fingon’s voice raised in anger is not a thing many can face. I stepped forward and raised my sword. I have no war-cry. They saw me and halted in their tracks. Beside me, Morwen swept her sword back and waited.

Fingon released an arrow and pierced an orc’s eye.

For a frustrating while, they evaded the ends of our swords. The skulked forward, needled us, and backtracked, only to creep forward again. None of us was willing to leave the others open to attack, and so we huddled together and waited for them to edge further. They did not. Fingon and the golden elf inflicted as much damage as they could. It was fortunate for us that none of these orcs seemed able to climb trees. The few who tried were shot dead instantly. I found myself wishing that there were more than two in those trees. The problem was that neither the arrows nor the archers were inexhaustible. Fingon was tiring slowly, and the other elf, his left arm clearly weakened as he went on, had to struggle to maintain his aim.

These orcs were the foes all elvenkind was up against; these creatures who had been bred only to do battle. Yet this was not how we lived our lives. Even in Himring, which I knew popular rumour cast more in the mould of a martial academy and less a citadel of the Noldor, we gave our time to more than merely the art of war. We would turn into orcs ourselves, if that was all we thought of and acted for.

I managed a look up at Fingon, who was down to his last few arrows. He liked to show off in the training grounds, like every other Noldo I knew, and he was popular for it, but he was sensible enough to do no more than strictly necessary against an actual foe. He was a good fighter, precise and effective. Once upon a time his impulsiveness would have got the better of him; that time was long past. This Fingon would not squander himself in a moment’s rashness. It was comforting to know.

He slithered down the tree once his arrows were exhausted and drew his sword. Taraen covered for him as he ran to join us, and we closed ranks again. We were caught swinging back and forth between attack and defence again and again; I wished, as I will always wish, that these things were as afraid of fire as the beasts of Beleriand seem to be.

They surrounded us again and were beginning to close in. We stood poised to slaughter, when the orcs at my back came running full tilt into us. The Sindar facing them were almost caught off balance at this sudden tactic, but our ears had picked up the cries of elven voices, surging up from the hill slopes. Tiny announced himself by throwing a knife right into the heart of an orc attacking Fingon.

They were a beautiful sight, all those Noldor, young, fierce, clad in gold, come to our rescue. My cousin led them himself. There was a terrible, wailing commotion as the orc-fiends were rounded up. Hack, chop, stab. Not a single one was left alive. Aegnor lived up to his name and got about twenty-five in a few blazing swoops. The rest of us divided the scattered, gibbering creatures between ourselves. I must have got twenty of them before the riders took over to shield us. The glade was ruined with orc blood scorching its earth, and the smoking, stinking ashes of the corpses we gathered up ourselves to burn in three large pyres. It would be barren for the rest of the year. Only another turn of the seasons would heal it.

Aegnor’s fortress was very similar to Himring. It looked forbidding in the starlight as we approached it, a bank of dark stone cut into the hillside itself, half-covered with hanging foliage and forest. But it was large and warm once we were inside, and the people were a good deal more easygoing than those in Himring. They were as courteous to me as they were to Fingon, something that surprised and pleased me a little. My own folk tend to look on all outsiders with suspicion - always excepting Fingon, whom they adore unquestioningly. That is more than even I do. Perhaps Fingolfin and I are the only ones united in this, but we know him best, after all.

Even Aegnor behaved like the cousin I had known in Valinor – taciturn, as he always was, but warm and a little awkward. I am the oldest, he the youngest of all us kin, a year younger than the twins. I never did know him very well, except as one of Fingon’s closer friends. Fingon was rather quiet, but he did not seem hurt by the skirmish, of that I was sure. We parted ways as we were shown to our rooms.

I washed myself and went to find Morwen, who looked a little sullen because the other women had laid out a skirt for her, and she had to wear it. We ate dinner together, after which I left to find Fingon. They told me that he was in the baths, so I went down to the springs. They were deserted, and at the far end I saw him, resting against the marble as Aegnor washed his hair for him. They spoke in low voices, and Fingon turned once to smile at him.

I had to laugh to banish the little flare of jealousy that rose in my heart, and I turned and left.

Sleep came, surprisingly easily for once; I slept until the sun shone through the vines hanging over my window. I lay in bed listening to the strange birds and the waterfalls for a while. It made me think of Fingon’s singing. I had not heard him for so long that I had almost forgotten that he sang at all. That pierced me strangely, a shard of regret. I threw open my doors and went out to find his room.

He was standing at his window as I went in without knocking, and refused to turn to look at me. The light fell along the lines of his body. Strangely enough, it made me want to smile. So what if we had not really spoken to each other for the three weeks we had been together? We were together, and he was alive and, as far as I could see, unhurt. To know that alone was tremendously relieving.

I shut the door firmly and went to him. He stood still, eyes fixed on the tree outside, unmoving even when I reached out to touch his hair left loose, silken and still a little damp.

I drew him closer and kissed his ear. He shivered and tilted his head a little. I kissed it a little more and said, “Stop sulking.”

He held still for a heartbeat, and then smiled, and smiled a little more, and we were laughing quietly before we knew it. He reached up and kissed me, and twined his arms around me.

“You did not come last night,” he said accusingly when we broke apart. I breathed in his scent, sweet and clean.

“I thought you might not want to see me,” I said honestly.

“Then what made you come now?” he asked, half-serious, and reached for another kiss before he stopped himself and looked at me intently. I looked back into his eyes and saw somethingin their depths that I did not like: today he did not trust me.

It happened, now and again, and I could not blame him. His valour is not absolute. He cannot trust himself to me unconditionally time after time, and I love him all the more for it.

I kissed him softly, and said, “I worried.” I felt it in me, the fear that had shadowed my thoughts for the months after he had been shot; I felt it all rise and dissolve as I held him, solid and real in my arms.

“How much?” he asked archly, against my mouth. I held him tighter and growled a little. He laughed.

“You should know,” he whispered, “I am indestructible.”

“Not without me around to make sure of it.”

Somewhere between the truth and a joke, but he acknowledged it. We sank further into an embrace; he pulled me to him and half-fell on his bed.

“I waited for you last night,” he breathed.

We worked off our clothes and made love as quietly as we could, hoping that the waterfalls would drown our voices. He was restless, still tired; it was doubly satisfying to feel his cry against my chest as he came.

“I love you,” he said, muffled as we lay together, my body on top of his, our fingers entwined. I think he dozed off a little. Presently he woke with a start.

“Hold me,” he ordered drowsily and shifted from under me.

“Fingon,” I said.

He made a vague noise.

“Will you sing for me?”

Wordlessly he hummed three tuneless notes in my ear and stopped. I laughed. Then I remembered I had not heard him sing at all. Not since he cut my hand off.

He shrugged and grew silent again.

“Fingon,” I said, after a while.

“Mm.”

“I love you too.”

He smiled without opening his eyes. “That’s alright.”

And it was alright.

The cold was already giving way to lighter weather, and we poured the last of our bad liquor into the drains. Tiny and Taraen fought a series of good-natured battles for Morwen’s attention, much to everyone else’s amusement. She, after garnering more than a few appreciative looks in her new attire, decided to play on her strengths and kept to wearing skirts until it was time to leave. But we tarried for a good while in Aegnor’s lands. The woods were beautiful, the air like a balm, and the hunting was excellent. It felt good, good to laugh and play and forget other things for a while, and be alone with each other as often as we could. It was a celebration of spring to love each other.

Fingon’s scars disappeared over time. I watched them fade from his body, flaring a dull red before they grew lighter and lighter, until I kissed a last one on his shoulder one day, and felt it disappear entirely beneath my lips.

Fic.

Sun, 19 Sep 2004 15:28:47 GMT

OTP counterpart to nelyafinwe's wonderful Quendi-in-modern-days romance Grace. A humble offering to bandonbanshee, as a post-exam celebration, and to maelipstick, the egger-on of nefarious designs on Quendi.

At 12.48 a.m., he finally found his voice and, raising his hands almost reverently, asked, “Are you real?”

At 12.49 a.m. the other man was still laughing a resonant, musical, all-too-real laugh.

Warnings: Slash, Maedhros/OMC, disjointed narrative. And whoriquendi. In a ~~starring role~~cameo, Fingon son of Fingolfin.

GILT

"We must not touch our idols; the gilt sticks to our hands."
- Flaubert in 'Madame Bovary'

EPILOGUE

one year later

From: “Daniel Newman” <dnman@hs.oxford.edu>
To: “Jan Parks” <lucyfer@marpelate.com>

Jan,

Relax, no one’s forcing you into anything – least of all The Man, I suspect. I admit I feel sorry for him, but please remember that I am, as always, in your corner. Hey, if you got cold feet at the altar we’d probably drive you away, veil and all. (Brian would, at definitely.) In that light The Man should be relieved that you only refused his engagement ring.

Sorry. We won’t talk about it like this. My phone is reconnected as of today so message me when you’re free, and I will call you. I’ve been allowing essay drafts to interfere with my sleep to good effect, don’t worry. When I do sleep it’s good sleep, though. Very relaxing – more relaxing than anything I’ve done in the last nine years. Between taking a first step after an accident and winning a ten-mile race, which is more satisfying? I don’t know. I think the first must be.

Can’t come down now, can you? It’s great here – all day brainless English boys skip lectures and go rowing down the Cherwell, affording me the sight of moderately attractive washboard stomachs and such like. I would try and hook one of them, if only to find out why the hell it’s called ‘punting’, but I’m afraid the hooking instinct in me is as yet dormant. You were right, the world IS bereft of hookable men at large. Disappointing when the fact is proved at Oxford, home to the children of princes and queens. I wonder if Alexander really was as good-looking as he’s made out to be. But I was at a seminar with Chelsea Clinton’s (somewhat) fetching boyfriend last week. Guess which of us got stared at more.

Alright, it was me. But I think they’re used to it now. And no more than three photographers ran away from the sight of Sam the Body over the weekend. The world’s way of gifting time, time to come back to life. :)

CALL ME.

Danny.

--

From: “Jan Parks” <lucyfer@marpelate.com>
To: “Daniel Newman” <dnman@hs.oxford.edu>

Send me the fucking number, you idiot!!!1 – Jan.

P.S. Hi to Sam the Body.

~*~

i.run for the shadows

Product search results for arch
Prophecies: Arch Live - $10.39 – Overstock.com
Arch: Nine [EP] - $13.88 – Wal-mart
String Quartet Tribute to Arch: Various… - $14.99 – artistdirect.com
Archtung Baby: Arch in concert with Bono - $16.00 – amazon.com

News results for arch - View today’s top stories
‘Arch’ break-up? – New York Post– 6 hours ago
‘Run For The Shadows’ scrapped – music.com – 12 hours ago
Revealed: Arch-exhaustion hits at last – ap.org - 7 minutes ago

AP, New York – Elizabeth Bishop , manager of rock group ‘Arch’, denied all reports of a band break-up here on Tuesday evening. Reading from a printed statement, Ms Bishop said, “’Arch’ has been in overdrive since it first came into being and the band members are in accord with each other that a vacation is now in order. This is by no means the break-up projected by the reliable sources everyone seems to be quoting at the world at large. Arch-fans rest assured that they will return in good time, and in greater force.” Rumours of a split in the group have persisted over the last few days, following almost immediately on the heels of the omission of Arch’s much-awaited fifth album from Marprelate Record’s lists for next year. A spokesperson for the company claimed that Arch was unsatisfied with the way the album, tentatively titled ‘Run For The Shadows’, was turning out, and reached an agreement with Marprelate executives that a break was required to “recharge creative batteries.”

“They’ve been on a roll,” the spokesperson said. “They’re to us what the Beatles were to Parlophone. Marprelate is happy if Arch is happy.”

‘Arch’ consists of singer-songwriter Daniel Newman, bassist Jan Parks, drummer Gabriel Barnes and guitarists Brian Harris and Jim “Oakey” Roanoke. The band members were unavailable for comment.

Related articles:

People:
“Jan Parks to wed?” - Read
“Spotted: Oakey and supermodel in clinch!” - Read
“Gabriel Barnes taking tabla lessons” - Read

Music:
“Profanities and Prophets: Interview with Arch” - $
“Arch-ive: the supergroup on their early days” – Read
“Limitless: Daniel Newman on aesthetics, religion and his music” $ read synopsis

Arts:
“Limitless: Daniel Newman on aesthetics, religion and his music” $ read synopsis
“Woodstock given new lease of life by alt rockers” - Read

Technology:
“Download, burn, share, we don’t care" : Arch supports file sharing” – Read

More…

~*~

ii.leaving on a

“Don’t cry, please,” Daniel said wearily. “Don’t get me started.”

“I’m not crying,” Jan blinked and snuffled a little. “I’m angry.”

Oakey put an arm around her thin shoulders, which she shrugged away. He draped it back. She shrugged again. They stood on the tarmac in silence.

“Don’t be angry,” Daniel said.

There was a sound of tires, and they saw Elizabeth and Gabriel running towards them.

“Brian didn’t come,” Gabriel offered, out of breath and a little apologetic. “Just – I think you should call him when you get there. To Oxford.”

“I’ll keep calling,” said Daniel, with a sudden flash of warmth. “I’ll keep calling you all.”

“Right,” said Jan dryly. Gabriel knitted his brows.

“I’ll call Brian,” he said.

“Call the numbers I gave you, Danny,” Elizabeth said. “And don’t talk to the other guys, okay. You know what I mean.”

“I know what you mean.”

There was a heavy, awkward silence, and then he pulled all of them into a hug.

“Thanks,” he said, stifled in Oakey’s barrel chest, caught between Jan’s hair and Elizabeth’s shoulder.

They slapped his back and ruffled his hair and hugged and kissed him, and then he and Sam the Body were on the plane, flying away.

~*~

iii.epistrophe

At 12 p.m. Sam the Body called Elizabeth and informed her that Daniel (age twenty-seven) had not unlocked his door for twenty-four hours and refused to pick up his phone. Elizabeth gave Sam the Body immediate permission to use the key to Daniel’s door.

At 12.01 p.m. Elizabeth called Jan to tell her to go upstairs and check on Daniel. Her phone was picked up by The Man, who woke Jan immediately and gave her the message.

Between 12.01 and 12.03 p.m. Oakey, Brian and Gabriel were all informed that Daniel had not opened his door for over twenty-four hours and refused to pick up his phone. Having each confirmed the latter fact, each left home immediately and drove over to Caucus Towers.

At 12.20 p.m. Brian, having driven his darling Ferrari at breakneck speed, was the first to arrive.

At 12:45 p.m. Oakey and Gabriel were just in time to take the lift to Floor 76 together.

At 12.47 p.m. Oakey and Gabriel pushed at the white door to find that Sam the Body was blocking it. As he stepped out of the way, they walked in to find Elizabeth and The Man pacing the balcony talking very fast and very softly to unidentified callers. On the table were two glasses of orange juice. One was untouched, the other had clearly been upset, its contents dried stiff over a day on the precious white carpet.

At the far end of the room they saw Brian standing awkwardly over Jan.

Jan was holding Daniel in her arms, petting him like a child.

Daniel was sitting on the floor, clearly in shock. His hands were cupped, covering his ears, clutching at his hair.

Daniel kept saying, “I can’t hear anything, Jan. I can’t hear anything.”

“Can you hear me?” Jan asked him, her voice fraying. “Danny, can’t you hear me?”

At 12.48 p.m., Brian struck his fist against the wall and shouted, “Where the hell is he?”

At 12.49 p.m. Oakey, Brian and Gabriel finished searching the house and ascertained that he was nowhere to be found.

At 12.49 p.m. Elizabeth told them that she was well aware of the fact that he was nowhere to be found and that Dr. Roberts was on the way.

Between 12.51 p.m., the arrival of Dr. Roberts, and 1.10 p.m., at which time Dr. Roberts, with the help of Jan and Elizabeth, managed to calm –sedate- Daniel into sleep, all Daniel said was, “I can’t hear anything.”

Over and over, he said “I can’t hear anything.”

~*~

iv.a little black spot

Daniel’s dreams often segued into nightmares. Friends grew fangs and chased him with daggers, crocodiles would crawl all of a sudden out of small, limpid pools. And his mother always, always shut the door in his face.

Maedhros repeated, “This is my cousin.”

“Your cousin,” Daniel said blankly, dripping over the bath mat as he clutched his towel. Behind him the bathroom door shut noiselessly. “Your cousin,” he said again. “But you told me your brother - it was your brother who was alive.”

Maedhros’ features glided into inscrutability. Daniel, caught halfway between panic and rising anger, said to the stranger, “I don’t know how you got in here.”

He marched, purposefully, from the bathroom door to the entrance. “Sam? Sam!”

“It does not matter,” the stranger said in a foreign, fabulous voice. Daniel knew instantly that Maedhros was not lying.

He never lied.

He turned, slowly. The stranger was a trifle shorter than Maedhros. His long hair was a black deeper than any black Daniel had ever known. His eyes were Maedhros’ eyes.

“Sam is downstairs,” Maedhros said quietly.

“What have you done to Sam?” Daniel stammered.

Maedhros looked at him the way he did sometimes.

”I’m sorry. I’m being stupid.”

“What gave you that idea?”

“Are you being sarcastic? No, really – it’s that look you get sometimes. When you don’t want to answer me. You remove yourself from my sphere.”

“Oh.”

“You’re doing it again. Ask me no more where those stars light, that downward fall in dead of night, for in your eyes they sit, and there...”

“Ai, you and your horrible verses.”

“Ai! Excuse me, this is grade I metaphysical love poetry from the glorious age of the Jacobeans.”

“As your target audience would say, Daniel – whatever.”

“Ai.Aiiiii. Maedhros, say it again. Ai, ai, ai – ow!”

The stranger’s face darkened with impatience. He turned to Maedhros and said something in a strange tongue. It fell like lightning on Daniel’s ears. Maedhros replied in the same way. The only word Daniel understood was one he had heard before. Findekáno.

The language made him alien. Daniel saw with blinding clarity now that he did not know Maedhros at all. Where was his lover, his friend, his Maedhros?

The stranger frowned and gestured exuberantly, encompassing the room and door and balcony. A smile began on Maedhros’ face.

“Let’s go,” the stranger finally exploded in English. The accent was markedly British.

“Go?” Maedhros asked softly. ”Do you have an eagle at hand again, Findekáno?”

A flash of the purest hurt Daniel had ever seen passed over Findekáno’s features.

He took Maedhros’ hand. Maedhros let him take it. “Maitimo.”

Maitimo. So ‘Maedhros’ was a falsehood.

“Come.”

Maedhros – not-Maedhros – looked at Daniel for a moment.

“This is my country,” he said to him.

There was no regret, no farewell, no explanation in his look. Or perhaps Daniel did not register it. He leaned against the wall. His breath crushed impossibly into his racing heart.

The morning grew hot. Daniel got up and stumbled across to the wall of palms for shade. Blindly he knocked against the table. Their glasses wobbled, and one fell over. Orange juice, undrunk and tepid, splashed over him, over the carpet, over the glass. Orange orange everywhere, and no Maedhros in sight.

~*~

v. poor boys and pilgrims

[laughs] “Baudelaire and Fincher, how could I object? Although they might object to being compared with a contract-labour guy like me.”

A light burning in liquid rage
A deity caught in a gilded cage…

”We get it. But these people clearly do not. We’re not causing this undefined trouble in quote marks with our music, we’re telling the truth about it. So, like, Platonic, f*** thyself.”

“If by “bi” you mean duplicity, like, ‘do I have two answers to every question you ask me?’, the answer is yes and no. Because I usually have more. So really I’m “multi.” Or “poly”.”

And the god and a demon dance before
The sea of parts
on the gilded shore…

“I’m not a fan. In a way the Beatles killed everything.”

“Oh no, I’m the worst person to ask about diets. Food is an area of darkness for me. I lived on pizza and juice when we were making ‘Nine’. Uh, pepperoni. [laughs] And orange.”

“I have no say in the matter. It’s why I’m well-dressed all the time.”

~*~

vi.and you are not me.

“Thank you,” Daniel whispered. He held and was held by some transforming power that night. An intense, almost spiritual joy lit up his being. He put his arms around Maedhros, dissolved himself in the warmth and beauty of him. “I love you.”

Maedhros smiled, and kissed the top of his head.

“You are my poetry,” Daniel said fervently. He took the white hand, kissed it, pressed it to himself. “You are my music, my heartbeat.”

“I am not you, Daniel,” Maedhros said, and pulled his hand away lightly.

“You are,” he said. He slid down on his knees, put his arms around Maedhros’ waist, almost in worship. “You are me. You have been in everything I have done, every word, every note I made.”

“Then am I real or not?” Maedhros asked amusedly. Daniel laughed, and put his cheek against the smooth, flat plain of his stomach.

“I don’t know,” he said delightedly. “I don’t know. Are you real?”

Maedhros knelt beside him, and kissed him. Daniel lost himself in the haze of love, the sweat and the circles of candlelight, and the wafting scent of orchids from another room, a gift from unknown admirers.

~*~

vii. ruby tuesday

“What the hell is the Rolling Stone song?”

“The Rolling Stone song! You sing it when you’re on the cover of Rolling Stone.”

“No, you don’t. We’ve never sung it before.”

“Third time pays for all, Danny-oh.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

“Shut up, spoilsport. Liz! Liz! What’s the song?”

“Let’s make up our own song!”

“Hey,” Daniel stood up. Rolling Stone with Arch on the altar of a Norman cathedral – Elizabeth had been worried about it but she couldn’t deny how it was so, you know, them - slid off his lap. “What’s the big deal, people? It’s just a magazine.”

Brian launched into the opening bars of “Ruby Tuesday”. Gabriel joined in, tapping on the piano lid. “Wooooo!” Jan went.

“I mean, Ashton Kutcher was on the cover last month. And Britney Spears will be on the next. Ashton Kutcher. Fuck. I don’t want to be Ashton Kutcher.”

“You’re just jealous of him!” Jan called as he padded out of the room. She slumped back against the sofa and smiled beatifically upon the closest person at hand. “Actually, Marigold, you’re prettier than Demi Moore.”

Maedhros inclined his head regally. “Thank you.”

“He’s a stupid boy sometimes,” Jan said in a conspiratorial whisper.

Elizabeth settled between them with a whiskey and cigarettes. “All boys are stupid.”

“Marigold’s smart though,” Jan said, putting a foot up on Elizabeth’s lap. “Aren’t you, Marigold?”

“Very,” said Maedhros, getting up. “I should go see what the anti-Ashton is doing.”

“You should ignore him!” Jan called in a loud voice. “He’s a stupid boy!”

“I heard you the first time,” a voice came faintly from the bedroom.

“Anti-Ashton,” Elizabeth snorted. “I could use that. You are smart.”

“You are all sozzled,” Maedhros said and exited with perfect grace.

“Still I’m gonna MISS YOU!” roared Gabriel and Brian.

Daniel crawled across the bed and laid his head in Maedhros’ lap as he sat down on the bed.

“Something wrong?”

He sighed. Maedhros laughed. “That tickles.”

Daniel hugged Maedhros’ knees. “Sometimes I feel so alone,” he said moodily. I didn’t think it would be this way. I thought – but there’s no other way. And there’s no way back home.”

“Did you dream again last night?”

He nodded.

Another pause. “No man’s land,” Maedhros said. His voice was soft; his words, as always, were cursory, precise, almost stilted. In another voice they would be stilted. “A fertile home for the imagination, or so say the poets.”

Daniel put his hand up to Maedhros’ face, thrilling to the touch of his cheek. “Are you in no man’s land too?”

Maedhros smiled. “It’s been a long time since I was anywhere else.”

Daniel reached up. “If there are two people in no man’s land,” he asked between kisses, “does it make a home?”

They fell back on the bed and curled up together. Distantly Daniel heard the door open and Brian say, “Shit,” and Jan giggle. “Sorry!”

The door banged shut again.

Maedhros said, thoughtfully, “Once I heard someone say that the wisest man was incapable of calling any country his own.”

“Is that a good thing?”

“I don’t think good and bad exist on that scale. Only indifference.”

“I don’t want to be indifferent. Do you?”

“…I’m incapable of indifference. I think I would have died long ago if I was indifferent.”

Daniel turned to Maedhros. “Where’s your country, Maedhros?” he asked.

Maedhros shrugged and smiled again. “I’ve lost the map.”

The dark eyes turned a trifle darker, and then Daniel fell back on the bed and said, “I want to be your land. Your people.”

The others were singing the same song again. Jan’s voice pierced harshly through their door. “Dying all the time, lose your dreams and you could lose your mind…”

~*~

viii.whole misadventured piteous overthrows

“She comes in colours everywhere,” he gasped.

Maedhros rubbed his back. “What?”

“Oh God, I’m trying to think straight. Oh God. This is bad.”

“What happened, Daniel?”

“Huh? Maedhros. Am I home?”

“Yes.”

“Who brought me home?”

“Sam and someone else. Are you on something?”

“I think so. I can’t be sure. No – no, I’m just tired. That was a huge show.”

“I saw you on TV.”

“I love Central Park,” Daniel said with difficulty. “My mother used to take us there when we were young. Fuck, it’s hot here.”

He rose and staggered out to the balcony, a huge stretch of marble that ran the length of the apartment, and breathed deeply. The night air was bracing. “Central Park,” he said. “God.”

Maedhros turned off the lights and followed him out. Daniel turned to him and stood transfixed, his arms draped over the cold rails.

“Your light,” he said, as if in a dream.

“Yes?”

“Your light is not daylight!” he exclaimed with sudden energy. His eyes shone. “Yon light is not daylight, sorry. That’s you. It is some meteor the sun exhales. Light thee on thy way to Mantua.”

He laughed a long, reeling laugh.

“God, I feel great,” he said. “And you are the nightingale and not the lark that nightly sings on yon pomegranate-tree.” He swayed a little as he released his hold on the railings, humming, and pulled himself up and hopped over them.

Maedhros’ voice was calm, even though his pallor was visible even to Daniel in the moonlight. “Daniel, get back up.”

Daniel smiled up happily. “It’s quite safe, my love; look, there’s a ledge below me.” He tried to twist down to look at the ledge, and his left hand lost its hold as he swung from floor 76 of Caucus Towers. “Whoops.”

“Daniel, please take my hand.”

“Can I go forward when my heart is here?” Daniel asked, and put his hand in Maedhros’. “Turn back, dull earth, and find thy centre out.” He pulled himself up by Maedhros’ strength, and fell forward into his arms.

He groaned and said, “Sorry,” as Maedhros scooped him up like a child and took him back inside, and laughed again. “Queen Mab hath been with me tonight.”

*

He could not talk the next morning.

“I’ve lost my voice,” he croaked and gestured, and coughed prodigiously. Sunlight streamed in through the windows. He groaned and burrowed further into Maedhros.

“Daniel, I find lying in bed uncomfortable after sunrise,” Maedhros said. “It is now one in the afternoon. It is imperative that I get up.”

“I can’t get up,” Daniel whispered. “My body won’t move.”

Maedhros sat up and combed his hair back with his fingers. “Is this normal?” he asked.

Daniel nodded listlessly. “The concert. Kills me.”

“Then going crazy like that is a bad idea.”

Daniel groaned louder as he tried to move. “Help,” he said weakly. “OJ and aspirin.”

“Should you not see a doctor?”

Daniel shook his head. “Please,” he begged. “Juice and aspirin. Now.”

~*~

ix.crush

Maedhros’s eyes sparkled with amusement as he leaned forward on the table. “What are you doing?” he whispered.

Daniel looked up, startled, and then turned sheepish. “Nothing, nothing. It’s just – “

“I thought that jug was full just now.”

“No, it wasn’t,” Daniel said earnestly as he put an expensive –and large- frosted glass jug, brimming with orange juice, back into one of the refrigerators. “We drank from it this morning.”

“So?” Maedhros asked.

“That’s sort of the point,” Daniel explained almost apologetically. “It has to be full all the time.”

“That is strange,” Maedhros said as he watched Daniel dump a carton of sugar-free orange juice back where it belonged, with several other identical ones. “Is it an obsession?”

“I need it,” Daniel said. “I need orange juice from a full carafe every day. Lots of orange juice. It’s like you would drink coffee every morning. Compulsorily from a clean mug.”

“No, it isn’t like that at all,” Maedhros said with a smile bordering on laughter. “This is funny. I have never known anyone addicted to orange juice.”

“It’s not an addiction,” Daniel said. “It’s a tried-and-tested quirk of my metabolism. Orange juice is the only thing that keeps me going after shows. Or when I’m writing.”

“Heard of crack, ever?”

Daniel laughed and played with a lock of his hair, and decided that he wanted to kiss Maedhros a little more. So he did, long and slow, leaning over the narrow white table. Their breath mingled, ghosting over the taste of orange juice.

“I could get addicted to you,” Daniel said softly as the kiss ended. “Is that – funny?”

“Isn’t everything?” Maedhros murmured as they kissed again.

Later, curled up in a ball against him, exhausted and sleepy and happier than he had thought it was possible to be, Daniel declared to Maedhros that he was his orange juice.

~*~

x.rebel prince

Jan Parks had eyes that were far, far older than her twenty-three years. She clung to Daniel in a boyish way, leaning on him, slinging an arm around his shoulder, putting her feet up in his lap. She was sitting on him now, in the breakfast lounge, eyeing Maedhros with frank curiosity. And, Daniel thought, a little suspicion.

“So what’re you called, pretty boy?” she asked, much too loudly.

Daniel winced. “Jans, my ear.”

“Maedhros,” Maedhros replied in his cultivated, detached, other-worldly tone.

“What, Marigold?” she repeated, also much too-loudly. The others looked up. “What’s Marigold?” “Is that his name?” “That’s not his name.”

Maedhros stood in the center of a ring of people, some armed with their instruments, and towered over them. A song swelled in Daniel’s mind as he watched him. Even standing still was invested with a spirit and a beauty when he stood still, Daniel thought. He wondered if he was the only one who felt this way. A tendril of fear crept into his heart and was quickly banished. The song morphed most irritatingly into the chorus of “Ruby Tuesday”.

“Are you a groupie?” Jan asked.

“Jan,” Daniel said in quiet horror, “Shut up.”

“Not anymore,” Maedhros said, perfectly calm.

She grinned. “That’s alright, then.”

Gabriel leaned in and touched Maedhros’ hair in unstudied curiosity. “Wow,” he blinked. “What do you use for it?”

Daniel said, “I should go.”

Among a chorus of yells and injunctions to stay, he stood and looked at Maedhros.

He held out his hand.

Maedhros smoothed his hair over a softly pointed ear.“I’m staying for breakfast, honey,” he said, eyes sweeping the room. It was the nervousness that made Daniel persist.

“We could eat at my place.”

“I am a little hungry.”

“It’s not very far.”

Daniel did not know why he felt that he would die if this creature of starlight and shadow, shimmering long after sunlight had eclipsed all the other glitterboys and girls, refused to go with him.

“Alright.”

His gratitude was boundless as the ocean.

~*~

xi.epistrophe

At 12 midnight, Daniel Newman, aged 24, critically acclaimed poet (“prophet”), singer of the newly-idolised rock outfit Arch, led his band members and friends unwilling - even a little afraid – into the mass of darkness, sickly coloured lights, sweat, smoke and adrenalin that was Club Xyro, pronounced ‘zero’.

At 12 midnight, Club Xyro, trendiest of trendy nightspots, fell over itself, packed with party animals and hobnobbing Who’s Whos though it was, in delight at Arch’s entry.

At 12:01 a.m. Daniel, cutting a swathe to the bar, stopped right in the middle of a wave of wild dancers and stood rooted to his spot like a man turned to stone.

At 12:01 a.m. the most beautiful person, thing, anything Daniel had ever seen, was sitting at the bar and looking straight at him.

Between 12:01 and 12:03 a.m.., Daniel, ushered to a seat at the bar next to the tall, pale man with hair like autumn leaves that fell to his waist, still refused to believe that he was seeing someone who really existed. Consequently he found himself at a loss for words.

At 12:20 a.m. Daniel was led down a flight of stairs through a tunnel of obsidian, winding and sloping that, had he been thinking of it, would have reminded him of hell, and finally into a bare white room, where the redhead stopped and turned and asked him how he wanted it.

At 12:45 a.m. Daniel, inspite of suggestive beckoning and some incredulous fondling, had no answer to this question.

At 12:45 a.m. his seducer leaned back against his pillows and asked him if he was sure he wanted this.

At 12.47 a.m. Daniel, blinded by light and fatigue and adrenalin, felt tears start in his eyes at the touch of this – being. He then noticed that one of his hands ended in a steel hook, not fingers.

He was asked if he wanted the hook taken off.

He shook his head.

He noticed a bowl with a single goldfish swimming in it at the far end of the room.

At 12.48 a.m., he finally found his voice and, raising his hands almost reverently, asked, “Are you real?”

At 12.49 a.m. the other man was still laughing a resonant, musical, all-too-real laugh.

At 12.49 a.m. Daniel finally found the courage to reach out and kiss him.

Between 12.51 a.m., the time at which they shed their clothes, and 1.10 p.m., at which time Daniel slumped bonelessly against the headboard, under the warm, naked weight of the man, he could only think, This isn’t real. This is a dream.

Over and over again, he thought, this has to be a dream.

~*~

xii.incendiary

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RS, London– To watch ‘Arch’ in action is to forget for a time that they belong to a generation that is growing up in an American crisis of rock and roll. It’s there, to be sure, in the underconfident edginess of their presence as they take to the stage in their opening act for U2 (whose music they both respect and keep a safe distance from). But their stance belies the performance itself, which can only be described as incendiary. To watch them is to know why they have come from behind (backed by maverick independents Marprelate) to outsell every other American artist except Barbra Streisand this year with their first-ever album, “Towering Wirefree”, and why U2 reportedly offered them the opening slot on their Retrospective tour - in person. “I see hope,” says Bono backstage as they launch into hit single “Gilded Cage” from their forthcoming album ‘Thunder and Merrylegs’. “I see power. I see honesty.” The word is out. Arch has arrived.

Undoubtedly the centerpiece of their music is the glorious, prophetic voice…Read more

~*~

PROLOGUE

the clocks strike thirteen.

Words are hard, but they must come. If I don’t write, I won’t hear anymore.

I am writing this on a cold bright day in April (clocks striking nine, a number I hate) on a bench in Central Park in New York City, New York State, the United States of America, North America, the Western Hemisphere of planet Earth in the solar system of the Milky Way, a galaxy far, far away from every other galaxy. Inspite of the impressive address, I am homeless. It’s been three days since my mother told me not to go back home. She found out about E.M. I ~~My fees~~ ~~It makes me~~

I miss my piano. However I have 59 dollars in my wallet and very little else and so buying another is somewhat out of the question. Besides I cannot be sure the bench or the police will quite reconcile themselves to a piano sitting plumb beside me. I wonder if art is similarly valueless elsewhere in the world.

I’m not making sense. Or perhaps I am and the world isn’t. I can’t say.

The weird chick at McDonalds’ said they needed a cashier yesterday. She seemed kinda cool but she has a most unromantic name. Jan. Is it Janet or Janine or Janice? Jane? Or Janessa or January or Janna? I should ask if the slot’s been filled. If it has then I can never go back to McDonalds’ again.

I’m cold.

Last night I dreamed of an island in the sea. It was raining all over the dream but the incredible sense of fulfillment – at the dream or the very act of dreaming? – made me smile. Is that my home?

I think it would be tremendously liberating to be an island. But liberation is very very expensive.

I feel feverish. I need a hot bath, and warm white clothes, and sunshine and money. I need a piano and safety and more paper and a bed. I need fruit juice. I need, aaargh, I need sex or something like. I would give anything I have to just be held. Just to feel.

Svefn-g-englar Starálfur Flugufrelsarinn Ný Batterí Hjartaô Hamast (Bamm Bamm Bamm) Viòrar Vel Til Loftarárase Olsen Olsen Ágaetis Byrjun, Avalon…

Today is my nineteenth birthday and I have decided that I am definitely running a temperature.

My name is Daniel Newman and my dreams are making perfect sense.

IxI

The last stretch of Icelandic Daniel scribbles on his paper is not a testament to my learning and imagination. *sulk* They are the titles of the tracks on the album “Ágaetis Byrjun” by Icelandic musicians Sigur Rós, which he was no doubt listening to the day before he got caught with his pants down.

‘Chapter titles’ and stuff taken from all over the place, including John Denver, David Bowie, The Rolling Stones, Paul Simon, R.E.M, Thelonious Monk, Rufus Wainwright, Sting, Romeo and Juliet (the play) and Nineteen Eighty-Four (the novel). Not in that order. Hope you enjoyed!

Sun, 12 Sep 2004 13:47:48 GMT

Hello all,

Just popped in to see how you are all doing. How are you all doing? Also to tell those of you on my flist who may not have heard, I am now part of a fic project called firetofire and I have just posted an entry there. Do go read if so inclined.

Wed, 08 Sep 2004 14:57:14 GMT

I am very fascinated by The Doors after having played a Doors Concerto in the studio a while back, although they troubled me a little earlier. I would have said 'frightened' but well, Noldo or no, there is no point to exaggerating that. Phrases like 'Roman wilderness of pain' and 'ride the highway west' just *feed* themselves into one's thoughts. Poor Nol is listening to a lot about compromise and cusps in her modernism classes, what with Prufrock and D H Lawrence (both liked by him, neither by myself.) She is getting rather cheesed off. So I make her sit down and listen to The Doors with me. Take a face from the ancient gallery, I say. We both like The End because among other things it is the soundtrack of the opening sequence of Apocalypse Now.

She explains the Oedipal implications and I am disturbed more but not enough to dislike the song. Can elves of the Blessed Realm have Oedius complexes? I had one about Maedhros' mother. For the longest time I thought she was the most wonderful woman in the world. *blush

The blue bus is calling us.

Well, well.

Fri, 27 Aug 2004 15:33:48 GMT

My father is here.

No, I love him. Really. With all my heart. He is my hero and I respect him as much as anyone else in the world, except for my mother.

For all those who want to know, the girl is fine, procrastinating today and reading Milton out loud. ~~Bitch, bitch, bitch.~~

GIP.

Sat, 21 Aug 2004 12:42:15 GMT

GIP.

My weapon of choice

Wed, 04 Aug 2004 15:50:58 GMT

theatrical_muse, not a home for me, asked about weapons of choice. Now this is automatically a subject of interest to me, and I decided to post about it.

Contrary to writers' assumptions, I am not primarily a swordsman, although I started out as one. It was quite by accident that I realised my knack for archery. My sister, ~~the little she-monster~~ began at an early age to want to go hunting, but she was terrible with the spear. No balance at all. My brother and I were quite fed up, so we sat down to make a bow and some arrows for her. The rest, as Thorondor and Glaurung among others will testify, is history. And to clarify matters, my sister grew up to have an astounding talent with the spear. (No Eol-jokes, please.)

We began to use the crossbow a lot after Maedhros' rescue. He learnt to shoot with one hand. Maedhros used to be a star archer, by the way. But then he has always had singleness of purpose.

I'm given to understand archery is not as romantic as the sword, for some. Well, quite apart from the fact that there's nothing romantic about massacre, I've loved archery for the way it frees one by narrowing down all centres of consciousness to that one, single point. There's nothing quite so intimate one-on-one swordplay (but if you must know we did duel often) but archery is so much more about oneself. Out in the field, it is only just one and one's wits. No heavy hand, no brute force. Blind luck, now and then, perhaps, but more often not. Archery feeds on instinct.

And I have very nice hands, too.

Tue, 06 Jul 2004 16:19:57 GMT

Thank you for your support, everyone. I am glad of it. Nol says I'm behaving very strange, less elf than human, less Patroclus (who I am NOT) than Ajax (who also I am NOT).

Why should I be Patroclus? I'll be Hector. Just because of that girl of mine and her story. No offense meant, Mags! You know I love you and your work.

Anyway. This is what she's been rather excited about (and consequently not working on) for the past four days or so. Blame it on the absent Lipstick, who wondered why, in all the fanfic, Thorondor so very rarely flew to the other side of Lake Mithrim. Nol says there's much in the story in her mind (since there's hardly anything on MS Word) that she owes to the brilliant Finch, both in tone and thought. At least, that seems to be the intent.

She finds it passing weird that fanfic makes her grieve that she has not had the time or opportunity to read more Christian philosophy.

“Is that Maitimo with him?” a low voice sounded in their ears, and Nerwen relaxed instinctively. It was her eldest brother.

The others nodded.

“Give him to me,” Finrod said. “The two of you bring Findekáno in quickly.”

He moved to take the slight figure from Fingon, who squinted and looked up at him.

“Alive,” he said, his voice hoarse and scratched with thirst. “H-he’s alive.”

“Leave him, Anaíro,” Finrod said, gently trying to prise the folds of the cloak from Fingon’s fingers. “We have you now.”

Fingon tightened his arms around the still form.

“Anaíro,” Finrod said, more insistently. “Hold him,” he told his brothers, and succeeded in awkwardly wresting Maedhros’ body from his arms just as Fingon finally sagged into his cousins’ hold.

“Nerwen,” Finrod said to her, “help me.”

As he shifted Maedhros’ weight in his arms, the cloak fell away slightly, exposing a patch of matted, muddy, unmistakably copper hair. Nerwen, finding herself encased in numbness, bent to hold up the exposed legs that trailed almost to the ground. She stared at the trails of blood and dirt that caked them.

“Your cloak,” Finrod said. “Cover him.”

She obeyed him, and suppressed a shudder as she lifted the broken limbs as gently as she could.

They need not have worried about shielding him from the eyes of their hosts. As they walked through the now-considerable crowd gathered about, the people, one by one, turned their faces aside.

Mon, 05 Jul 2004 01:49:34 GMT

There are 114 individuals interested in "maedhros" on LJ.

There are 66 interested in me.

Mon, 21 Jun 2004 01:48:48 GMT

I love getting Nol late for class?

Meldo? Don't you agree with this result, despitew the stubble and all?

Which generic smut novel character are you? (With somewhat relevant pictures!)

The Rascally Unshaven Rogue

Everybody loves a rebel, and the unshaven rogue is no exception. With your mannish stubble, sly expression, and sinful proficiency with a weapon, you have a way with women unmatched by any other, not even Shaft or James Bond.

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Fanfic writers, please take note. Yes, Nol, this means YOU.

Although - *worried* that poor girl was wearing disgraceful clothes.

Sat, 19 Jun 2004 16:27:16 GMT

Why does Nol always want stories to have happy endings? Does she believe that life imitates art?

For mortals, I think, life and art are interchangeable. We elves are simpler creatures. Art, is always incomplete. Even music, that makes the world; even language, that sets us apart from those who do not speak with tongues. We exalt our souls when we speak, Turukano used to say.

I do not think so. I think language is as limiting as a lack of it. Turukano suffered from the Noldor misconception that the mind and the soul are the same thing. It is only the mind that has limits.

I do not deal in words. Words and I have failed each other at all the important times. It is strange. I am a Noldo, I am my father's son. The tradition of bon mots, so to speak, can achieve no greater age or depth. And yet.

And yet.

:) See?

I love heights.

Maedhros made me hate them.

I hate the cold.

But the Ice was colder than cold. And sometimes, so is Maedhros.

Fri, 18 Jun 2004 16:08:46 GMT

Nol was too ashamed to post this in her own journal, so I, as usual, have taken responsibility. The reasons I am willing to do this:

1) Valiant, therefore unafraid etc. of public opinion.
2) It's a sweet story that probably really would have happened if we had heard of either Hollywood, or Serendip (which is from where English gets serendipity), in Aman.

Presenting: An unashamed bit of fluff made of polysyllabic words, precocious children, the barest hint of my first kiss with Maedhros, and backstory that is as incomprehensible as the title.

Nol does not want to drag others into this undertaking, but out of politeness she really ought to thank ladyitarille *hugs Itarille* for reading and encouraging.

I dedicate this story to everyone who needs it. ~~All none of you.~~

P.S. Yes, it really is my mother-name. It's not incongrous, but that's a story for another time.

G for gay, and other harmless elements.

When Ambarussa saw the stranger walk toward him in the meadow, he felt that he ought to have known him.

It was a most peculiar feeling. Perhaps this is why he did not run away, although he was not fond of people who were not his brothers or his father. This person, on the whole, looked like he could belong to the family. He had hair like Father’s – oh, how Ambarussa longed for dark hair like Father’s! – and he carried a harp, like Káno, although Káno’s harp was bigger and more beautiful.

He stood his ground, the wind at his back blowing his red hair out of its braids, and looked up at the person who was not Father and not Káno.

“Hello, star,” the person said, looking back at him.

Ambarussa did not care for the nickname. He was never called anything other than his names at home. Sometimes Káno called both of them “children,” usually as a reprimand. Sometimes Nelyo called them “Russandol” for a laugh. He hadn’t done that in a while, now that Ambarussa thought about it. Maybe Nelyo, too, was growing up.

Having given the stranger a good long look, Ambarussa returned his greeting in an off-hand, if cautious manner.

“My name is Findekáno,” said the elf. The feeling of familiarity heightened ever so slightly. But he, Ambarussa, would have known this person if he really was meant to be known.

So he shrugged and said, “I am Telufinwë Ambarussa,” by way of introduction. “Son of Fëanáro,” he added graciously, the way Nelyo would.

This apparently made an impression, as the stranger stood looking down at him with an odd, grave look on his face.

“What brings you to our meadow?” asked Ambarussa.

Findekáno put a hand to his heart. “Not an idle walk, I assure you, son of Fëanáro,” he said. “I am, in fact, here to see someone.”

“And who, in fact, is this person?” queried Ambarussa.

“He is, in fact,” said Findekáno, and all at once his voice faltered slightly, “in fact, your brother. Your eldest brother.”

“How serendipitous!” said Ambarussa, and paused for effect.

Findekáno was not unimpressed. He raised his brow – just so – there! That was Father all over, that brow. The mystery deepened.

“Then the hour of my arrival is fortuitous?” he coughed.

“Indeed,” said Ambarussa. “He is not inaccessible.”

“Splendid,” Findekáno said, breaking out into one of the nicest smiles Ambarussa had ever seen. Ambarussa could not help smiling back, although he thought ‘splendid’ was hardly a word to be jubilant about.

Beckoning to him, Ambarussa turned and strode away, his braids streaming back from his face.

Pityafinwë, also an Ambarussa, loved the winds that blew out of the hills. Both Ambarussa did, although they rarely came out to the meadow, since they had to be accompanied by a brother or more at all times. And even then, as everyone complained, they had a tendency to run away at the slightest provocation. Not that anyone was being unfair, of course. As Nelyo had explained, it was a conflict of interests. The twins wanted to wander. Their brothers did not. The only way to solve this problem, Nelyo said, was to make sure that the twins did not wander anywhere together. They could take their turns exploring, and come back when they felt like (which would be soon enough – they disliked being too far apart.) Not the ideal arrangement but certainly the most reasonable, with minimum trouble for all concerned, was that not so, twins?

That was the trouble with Nelyo. His plans were always utterly reasonable, even if the twins did not like them one bit. Ambarussa suspected that Nelyo’s reason did not deserve the importance it received.

Still, they could have done worse. Nelyo was certainly very abstracted these days, but they knew this had nothing to do with them. What if he had not loved them at all?

Ambarussa tugged at the long lock of his brother's hair he had been playing with.

“Put me down, Nelyo,” he said for the third time, patiently. Nelyo rarely flew into tempers, but it did not do to be impatient with him.

Nelyo sighed, and snuggled him closer before he put him down. Ambarussa looked up at his face, and then wordlessly slipped a hand into his.

“You’ll be too old for me to carry you soon, Pityo,” Nelyo said after a while.

“I know,” Ambarussa said patiently. “But I don’t have to use up all my time before that being carried around, do I?”

“Why not? It’s very pleasant to be carried around. You’ll miss it when you grow up.”

Ambarussa did not think Nelyo was very good at being whimsical. “I don’t miss it right now,” he said, still patient, “however, if you want to carry me, you should say so.”

Nelyo smiled wanly. “May I, please?” he asked.

“Of course,” said Ambarussa, and stretched out his arms to be lifted.

The breeze did blow faster past him when he was at a height, he reflected. And Nelyo was a comfortable sort of person by whom to be held, unlike certain other brothers he could name.

He wriggled a little in Nelyo’s arms. His hair flew into the older elf’s face.

“Mmph,” Nelyo said.

“Someone’s coming,” said Ambarussa, and Nelyo turned.

In spite of the billowing winds, there was an utter stillness between the stranger and Nelyo that the twins could feel almost tangibly. A hand on Telvo’s shoulder tightened, even as Pityo felt his older brother’s shoulders relax of a sudden.

“Come,” Telvo said, and pulled Findekáno forward.

Pityo looked down at his twin and jiggled his eyebrows, because the stranger looked terribly familiar.

“This is Finde—”

“Anaíro.” Nelyo’s voice was low.

Findekáno Anaíro was looking at Nelyo with a strange, intent expression on his face.

“Your condition is met,” he said to Nelyo, slowly. “It is ten years today.”

“It felt like a hundred,” Nelyo whispered.

“So it did. And yet,” said Findekáno, “it is as nothing, now. You. You are all.”

Nelyo smiled then. It made the twins feel strange, because of the faintest memory they possessed of that smile on someone else’s face.

“I hoped you would – not forget,” Nelyo said.

Anaíro-who-remembered had eyes that were suspiciously bright, although it may simply have been the waxing Telperion that made them seem so.

“You were the one who thought I would forget,” he said. “Or perhaps that I ought to have. But it will not be so, Maitimo. It cannot be. I have counted every breath since you left Tirion up to this day.”

There was another long silence. Pityo slipped down easily to meet Telvo, their fraternal keeper seemingly oblivious to their presence.

“What is ten years today?” Pityo felt honour-bound to ask when the silence stretched on too uncomfortably for them.

“No day at all,” Nelyo said, never taking his eyes off the other elf. “Except the most beautiful in all the world.”

Pityo ignored this, and welcomed Anaíro to their meadow politely.

“Thank you,” said Anaíro, looking down at him then. He had moved closer to Nelyo, brushing his arm against the other’s. “You must be Pityafinwë.”

“I am,” said Pityo.

“Also sesquipedalian, I presume,” Anaíro said, although he was now again looking –smiling- into Nelyo’s eyes.

“What?” the twins asked.

“What?” Nelyo laughed, crinkling his brow.

“Did you make that up?” Pityo asked curiously.

“How old are you?” Telvo demanded, feeling somewhat cheated by their surprise guest.

Nelyo answered for him. “Seventy.”

“You look about that age,” Telvo remarked.

After yet another prolonged silence, the twins decided that they were (in fact) being ignored, and wandered off. They were not too far when they heard Nelyo say, “Will you stay awhile, Anaíro?”

They heard Anaíro say, “I have no clothes.”

“How did you get here?” they could hear the frown in Nelyo’s voice.

“I walked.”

They heard a strange sound and turned around to investigate, but the elder elves were quiet, only caught in a gentle embrace. From where Pityo stood, he saw Anaíro deposit a kiss on one side of Nelyo’s throat, as Pityo himself did when he was being carried around sometimes, although Nelyo never shivered and closed his eyes as he did now.

“You can borrow mine,” they heard Nelyo say faintly, as he cupped Findekáno’s face in his hands, tilting it slightly upwards. “Although – they may not fit very…”

“Maitimo…”

The twins ran away, thanks in part to a feeling that they were not meant to be there, but mostly because the conversation had irredeemably deteriorated into incomprehensibility.

Sun, 13 Jun 2004 14:22:04 GMT

doltaghey, in response to my last post, suggested this. Thank you, doltaghey.

Nol goes to college tomorrow. Alas for her, this means no sleeping late. My poor girl will have to reverse her sleeping patterns now.

But as I was saying:

Crosses at things I've not done.

(_) I never have been drunk.

I know elves aren't popularly considered to have too much of a head for alcohol, but it ought to be clarified that this is true only for that new breed that made it into The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. [insert genteel contempt here] Hurin used to be horrified at the amount of dwarvish ale I could drink at one go and still be Kingly.

(_) I never have smoked pot

Have, and liked the forgetting part. I suppose I lack appreciation of the finer side of misery.

Nol: Repression is one of his best-preferred coping mechanisms.

(_) I never have kissed a member of the opposite sex

Have, and hated it. That it was the Elf Formerly Known as Nerwen may have something to do with this.

(_) I never have kissed a member of the same sex.

I do not believe I have anything enlightening to add to this field.

(X) I never crashed a friend's car

I cannot drive. Besides, I like riding trains.

(X) I never have been to Japan

*wistful* I would have if Maedhros wasn't about to sell himself for heroin.

(_) I never ridden in a taxi

Have, and thrown up out of one too. *g* See above, actually.

(_) I never had anal sex

And Eru said, 'Let there be sex'.

(_) I never have been in love.

(_) I never had sex.

Right now, I am thinking of how vastly opposite to this meme Nol's would be.

(_) I never have had sex in public

Sure I have. In the British Museum, right under the 14th-century Flemish tapestry. To be sure, we didn't intend for people to see us. It seemed like a very boring tapestry.

(X) I never have been dumped

Or at least, I have successfully resisted dumping.

(X) I never shoplifted

Fingolfinians do not loot. They may sail in and take what they own after a fair fight, but looting is crossed out from the adopted list of Feanorian 'can-do's, right with 'rape' and 'pillage'.

(_) I never have been fired

I have. I hate Wagner and screwed him up utterly. It was my second job.

(_) I never have been in a fistfight

Have, in intensely bloody ones. With one hand tied behind my back. Which, as it turned out, was to my disadvantage because Maedhros could/can break bones with his right arm.

(X) I never had a threesome

*blink* Is that supposed to be fun?

(_) I never snuck out of my parents' house

Ehehehehehe.

(_) I never have been tied up.

Have.

(X) I never have been caught masturbating

Well, except on purpose.

(_) I never pissed on myself

Back in the day, heroes had no portable toilets to zip up in their knapsacks.

(X) I never have been arrested

I have been close to it for disrupting traffic, however.

(_) I never made out with a stranger

Well, I didn't know Nerwen all that well.

(X) I never stole something from my job

See Fingolfinian Code of Conduct. Also I'd never want to.

(_) I never celebrated New Year's in Times Square

I have, with the Israel Philharmonic.

(X) I never went on a blind date.

Is it a mortal charity exercise?

(X) I never lied to a friend

Again, the notion of Elves saying "both yes and no" has its roots in the Latter Days. Where you could afford not to make life-altering decisions on the spur of a moment.

(_) I never had a crush on a teacher

We count our elders as teachers. Therefore, Nerdanel was my teacher.

...Maedhros, too, of course. He taught me everything I know.

(_) I never celebrated Mardi Gras in New Orleans

Have. Also in Paris.

(_) I never have been to Europe

Although sometimes the currency bewilders the light out of me.

(X) I never skipped school.

What? And commit a sin on par with dog-earing pages???

(_) I never slept with a co-worker

Well, we were partners in the whole Beleriand mess.

(_) I never cut myself on purpose

I was twenty-six and wanted to know what my blood tasted like.

(X) I never had sex at the office

(X) I never have been married

Redundant.

(X) I never have been divorced

Redundant.

(X) I never had sex with more than one person within the same week

Although I could say a lot about the different kinds of Maedhros there are.

(_) I never have posed nude.

I make a very good nude model. I can't deprive the world like that; I have responsibilities.

(X) I never got someone drunk just to have sex with them

I have never needed to.

(X) I never cheated on my significant other.

I won't even dignify that.

(X) I never had sex with my boss

He was too sick when he was 'boss'. I've had sex when I've been boss.

(_) I never have eaten snake meat

Possessed of childlike elven curiosity, been to China. Also did not throw up.

(X) I never jumped out of an airplane

I must try this!

(X) I have never been to a nudist event

...not technically.

(_) I have never been naked on the internet.

I have been naked while surfing.

(X) I have never had a foursome

*blink blink* Is this supposed to be fun?

(_) I have never played golf

I'd take eating snake meat over it anyday.

(_) I have never played truth or dare

When you run with the Feanorians, you learn to play all kinds of dangerous games.

(_) I have never been to the Southern Hemisphere

Brazil, Argentina, South Africa, Australia...

(X) I have never caught my parents having sex.

No. They didn't share Feanor and Nerdanel's love of the outdoors.

(X) I have never been caught having sex by my grandparents.

*blush* I'm afraid Finwe was all too glad that his elder grandsons weren't caught in his sons' feud when he found Mae and I huggling in the library.

(X) I have never been to a frat party.

Are they also mortal charities?

(X) I have never had sex in an airplane.

*g* Not yet.

(_) I have never broken a bone.

If only.

(_) I have never had an operation.

If only.

(_) I have never been spanked.

...well.

(_) I have never been lewd with caramel

...well.

Judging by the multiple numbers of Maedhros on my f-list...

Fri, 11 Jun 2004 14:58:06 GMT

If there is someone on your friends list you would love to have a(n epic, sweaty, damn near legendary, 12 hour) fuckathon with, post this same exact sentence in your journal.

It may be presumptuous of me to suppose it, but I think it must be easier for same-sex couples. Although it must take the strength of the 'ancient world' to go on for a week, as he will testify. Also Finwean stamina. :)

Come to think of it, this meme is slightly redundant. None the less enjoyable for being a been-there-done-that exercise, of course, but a little too -flagrant- to be meaningful. I mean, we've done it before, we'll do it again, and it's excellent for the most part. What's there to say?

Now a name-it-we've-done-it exercise ... that might be significantly more lively.

Fingon,
whose masculinity is not threatened in the slightest by his love for a warm, simple cuddle. ~~It's Maedhros. What's not to cuddle?~~

Mon, 07 Jun 2004 16:06:45 GMT

Please excuse my writer over the next little while. She's very exhausted and is having a bit of a bad time in RL. She loves you all very much.

More importantly:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY FINCH!!

Many snuggles. Nol will tell you the story of your failed birthday stories when she can.

IMPORTANT: ELF REQUEST!

Thu, 03 Jun 2004 17:06:15 GMT

It has come to my notice that more often than not, you writerly-types distinguish me by my hair accessories. Which I have nothing against. After all, it was the lover who first suggested them, and they did have a transforming effect. (That and the afterglow.) I went from an exceptionally handsome Finwëan to a one-Quendë industry of hott thanks to him.

*takes a moment to calm self over extreme good taste of Maedhros*

NOW.

The reason I call this to your attention is because almost all of you insist that I have black hair 'tied with gold thread'.

WTF??

I have hair that is over 3 1/2 feet long and is extremely thick and heavy and fragrant and .. yes. It forms a substantial part of my overall gorgeousness. It cannot, will not, is not to be held together by "gold thread". What part of my hair looks like a Valentines' Day card to you? It's also not "gold ribbon", because let's face it, Noldo or not, that is just tacky.

Therefore, consider this my humble plea to all you lovely Silm~~slashers~~ficcers reading this to kindly stop referring to my hair as 'black with gold thread in it' or by any variants of the phrase. 'Braided with gold' would be the closest approximation. 'Gold cord' is acceptable, as is 'tie' or, in a stretch, 'band(s)'. I think it's best you avoid describing it closely if you can help it. After all, there are more important ~~sex scenes with Mae~~ things in your stories that you will want to concentrate on.

Thank you very much for your kind co-operation.

P.S. Yes, I still braid my hair with gold and yes, I still make women swoon with desire.

Nol wanted to post another random!drabble here but I restrained her. It is really awful and she spent very much time laughing over it. Besides, she has her own journal in which to descend the depths of bathos.

GIP

Sat, 29 May 2004 07:45:31 GMT

So she found some place on the WWW where you can get these done.

I like the colour scheme, don't you?

*huggles up to s/w lover and gazes at candy heart happily*

Story: A Last Reckoning

Mon, 17 May 2004 19:51:11 GMT

Okay. Fuck Maedhros. This is what happens when Nol decides that I am a Norse demi-god.

*surreptitiously cuddles Ereinion because evil writer removed all traces of cuddliness from fic in a Nordifying bid*

Nol would like to claim that she wrote this fic as an experiment in elven nihilism, which is a sort of paradox. It will no doubt explain why a lot of this goes round and round in circles. In other news: this fic was also based on some lines from a Great War poem quoted at the end of this post, and therefore entered into a HASA challenge about the same.

In this attempt to trace "the terribly fated train of personal sacrifice" that runs through three generations of my (AU) bloodline, she began writing a story that almost spiralled out of control. Because we all live to humiliate her, and because people who read this LJ ought to have all sorts of horrible special privileges, this is the part of the fic that she cut out ruthlessly.

~*~

“Father.”

“Oh.” Fingon started a little and turned, then settled back against the fence and smiled. “I didn’t hear you coming, Ereinion.”

“I know,” he said awkwardly. “You…you ought to be careful.”

Fingon began to say something, then stopped and shook his head. “Yes,” he said, and smiled again. “I suppose I really ought to be.”

Other people had often sat with Ereinion and told him how unfortunate he was to have never seen Valinor, or never really known the bliss of the Long Peace. He had some memories of that time, but he had been very young when the Bragollach struck, and the grandfather he had never known very well had died fighting Morgoth. Mostly things had always been like this, grey and silent, with brief periods of tension, and his father had always been like this too, kind and tired, almost always away fighting, and preferring to watch the lake quietly, Ereinion at his side, when he was at home. Ereinion loved everything about his father. He hoped he would be like him when he was older; not exactly like him, perhaps, but more like the elf people said he used to be, someone he saw flashes of occassionally, and enjoyed very much.

“Grim weather,” Fingon remarked, looking up at the skies clouding over. They had cleared in the last few months, and he had been at home a little more often now. Things had seemed more – hopeful, somehow. And now Maedhros was here, and from the looks of it, there was some great plan afoot.

Still, he thought, it had not lifted the invisible weight off his father’s shoulders.

“That’s why I came out,” he replied. “We should go inside before the rain comes.” Rain was never good. It brought down poison from the clouds.

Fingon stretched lazily. “We can make a run for it.”

Ereinion looked dubiously at him, and Fingon laughed suddenly, and patted his arm. “We’ll be fine, stop worrying.”

That was the elf he wanted to be like.

Now read the REAL fic and see what it's like.

There were elves in his army who had seen the War of Wrath, and still came to fight again. It was out of sheer vengeance. Darkness was the enemy; darkness was to be fought back at all costs. He, too, had helped break Thangorodrim and avenge the kings he was named for. He had been High King then as well. But he had been young, and there had been older, wiser, stronger people to aid him and his his little band of vengeful Noldor.

Evil is random; senseless. It holds back and holds back, then it engulfs the world in a moment. It makes it difficult to defeat. Even impossible.

Gil-galad bowed his head and pressed his palms to his burning eyes. Mordor fumed; his armies were wasting away, some before his eyes, more in their hastily dug, shallow graves in this barren wasteland. Already one of Elendil’s sons was dead. It had been days since Eärendil’s star had been seen through the clouds of smoke. No, day was the wrong word. There was no day and night here. Like everything else they knew and loved, day and night had lost their meaning. Time itself hung suspended over them. Time was meant for other people in other places, where things had a beginning and an end, where there was clarity and sense, comfort and joy and love and life. This was not life. This was an exercise in futile waiting. They were standing around waiting for death to take them.

We, I and those I love, have learned hard things by hard ways.

He glanced over at Elendil, standing close by. His hair had been greying when they first came to war. Now it was a shock of white, hanging down to his tired shoulders, with no hint of black in it. He looked as old as Gil-galad felt.

He had come this far, carrying the hopes of a people on his shoulders – glory, victory, the final defeat of darkness. And now they crouched around the foothills of a giant, unsure and unaware of everything except this waiting.

And now we will go on. Something yet may be salvaged; not reputation or pride, I think. They will cease to matter. But something – a little more space within the circle of light against the darkness. I do not know what. Something.

~*~

“But what? And why?” Ereinion asked, confused and angry. “Why is it necessary for you to ride into battle now?”

“It is now or never.”

Ereinion shook his head. “Nothing is ever quite so plain.”

“But it is,” Fingon said in a low voice. “We have come to the end of all things as we know them, for better or for worse. We fight for the better.”

“And,” Ereinion strove to conceal the tears in his throat from a father whom he had never known to cry, “is death better than life?”

Fingon was weary, but still tall and proud, and his eyes were brighter and harder than Varda’s stars. “Is defeat better than victory?” he asked. “Is despair greater than hope? We know the answers to these questions; we think we know them.”

He stood, and faced the window from where the darkest peak of Angband could be seen.

“In a battle, it is always the stronger force that wins. Wrong has defeated right before now. It may be that it shall defeat right once more. But I shall not stand by and wait for it to happen.”

Ereinion went to stand by his father. “But you have hope?” he asked, because he did not understand, and wanted reassurance.

And Fingon was silent.

“Do you?” he repeated, timid, desperate.

“The stronger force wins,” Fingon answered after a long time, not meeting his son's eyes. “Now I think my despair is strong enough.”

~*~

He had raged against Fingon’s decision to fight the Fifth Battle a long time after news of his death had reached Círdan’s court. Despair had cancelled out hope, he argued to the wind. And death had cancelled out life – why? he asked. What was it that his father valued above life itself?

“Drink, aranya,” Elrond came up softly, holding out a flask of stale water, his eyes rimmed red with smoke. He had fallen quietly into the routine of expectation, like everyone else who still lived. But what did he expect?

“Why are you here, son of Eärendil?” Gil-galad asked him tiredly.

“For you, ereinion*,” the answer came unhesitant.

“And why am I here?” Gil-galad asked.

Glory, honour, rewards for valour. They cease to matter. Why, why, why, you ask. You would climb a mountain and reach the peak, and you would be sorry if the view did not seem enough. I do not know what your answer is, Ereinion. I do not want to hope that you will ever have to find out for yourself.

Elrond looked at him silently for a while, and shook his head.

But I can go this far. It was enough for Fingolfin, and it is enough for me.

“Enough,” Gil-galad said out loud. Close by, his men raised their heads. He saw a building light reflected in all their grey eyes, and realised it was his own.

His challenge was accepted; the wrath of Mordor awoke. He did not see his soldiers gather in great force as he strode past them, nor did he hear the cries, disparate at first, then gathering force, making his name a battle-cry and his radiance a force of their own. His final decision flared in his mind, dimming and darkening every other lingering thought. He did not see Elendil and Elrond, falling in behind him. He did not hear Sauron’s craven laugh as a voice like a storm went up from the plain of Dagorlad.

“Auta i lomë! Night is passing!”

He had calculated enough. Everything on this field cancelled out something else. And there was no more to reckon with. If there was anything at all to be salvaged –

- I will salvage it. For this is who I am, Father. My answer is no different from yours.

There are heroes who have heard the rally and have seen
The glitter of a garland round their head.

Theirs is the hollow victory. They are deceived.
But you, my ghost, if you can go
Knowing that there is no reward, no certain use
In all your sacrifice, then honour is reprieved.

To fight without hope is to fight with grace,
The self reconstructed, the false heart repaired.

--Herbert Read,
To a Conscript of 1940.

Yes, yes, second post in two hours. Deal.

Extry

Mon, 17 May 2004 16:41:52 GMT

Missing scene from 'Swimming Against Waves' that really would have made the fic if Nol had been able to write it to her satisfaction. Also would have asolutely stolen thunder away from urchin little mortal boy.

“What are you doing here?” Maedhros asked, sitting up.

Fingon, at the edge of the bed, looked pointedly to Maedhros’ right. “What is he doing here?”

“I don’t understand.”

“You ought to be ashamed of yourself.” He looked at Elros and scowled. “Little urchin.”

“He knows his mind.”

“I see. And does he know yours?”

“No...” he said. Fingon got up and began to circle the bed, pulling the sheet off Maedhros to cover himself.

“...I don’t know,” Maedhros amended.

“Do you know anything?”

“It would seem not. Why are you here?”

Fingon caught hold of his hair and pulled it backwards. “Do you love me?”

“Let go – ow!”

Fingon let go. “That,” he said with a satisfied smile, “will teach you. Say you love me.”

“What is this childishness?”

Fingon raised his eyebrows.

“What is this?” Maedhros repeated, his breath coming short. “Where have you been?”

“Oh, dancing,” Fingon said. “It’s all fun and games, my love.”

Maedhros gazed at him uncomprehendingly.

“I’m being wry.”

“You - you never were before.”

Fingon sighed. “We never had time before.”

“We had nothing but time. Once.”

“Yes. But I think we laughed at all the wrong things then.”

“Futile paradox,” Maedhros mused.

“Isn’t it,” Fingon leapt lightly back on to the bed, missing Maedhros’ legs by a fraction.

They sat in silence for a little while.

“You don’t have much time, do you,” Fingon said at last.

“I don’t think so.” A new thought struck Maedhros. “Is that why you’re here?”

“You mean as a messenger?” Fingon seemed to find this very amusing. “No.”

“Then why?”

He stopped laughing, and looked angry and sad all at once.

“I wish you would stop asking foolish questions once and for all, Maedhros,” he said tartly.

“I do not ask foolish questions,” Maedhros replied with some dignity.

“No,” Fingon shook his head with heavy sarcasm. “You just do foolish things for foolish reasons.”

Maedhros was silent.

“I could catalogue all of them but I doubt you need me to.”

“I gave your father the crown,” Maedhros said feebly. “That was not foolish.”

“Yes, you and I both benefited greatly from that, as far as I can remember. No, really, you’ll be surprised at how much I can forget. But tell me. What else have you done right?”

“What right was ever done to me?” Maedhros asked.

Fingon sighed.

“You don’t have an answer to that,” Maedhros noted. “You have no idea what it is like. No one does.”

He leaned into the hand Fingon reached out to cup his cheek. “Mmm,” he purred softly. “No idea.”

Fingon stretched over and kissed him. “Oh love,” he whispered between kisses, “it is still the wrong question.”

Maedhros made an incoherent sound against the softness of Fingon’s lips.

Suddenly Fingon pushed him flat down against the bed and climbed over him, sitting across his stomach. Maedhros’ “Oof!” sounded like a whisper in his own ears. His head felt very heavy.

Fingon sat there, observing him.

“I do love you,” Maedhros told him at last, out of breath. Fingon smiled and leaned in closer over him.

“I know,” he said, and then came in closer. “And don’t you dare go off with this little –” his lips curled murderously, “thing. Or else…”

“Or else?” his own voice sounded incredibly distant, with the blood roaring in his ears as Fingon leaned all his weight down on him.

“I’ll kill you,” he said heatedly.

Maedhros laughed. Fingon drew back sulkily and flounced off the bed again.

“I love him,” Maedhros said, looking up at the darkness.

Fingon came back to stand over his bed. His hair fell over his face.

“I love him,” Maedhros told him softly.

Fingon smiled, a pale smile. “I didn’t mean it, Maedhros.”

He extended a hand then, pulling away. “Get up, beautiful,” he smiled. “It’s going to be a lovely day.”

Maedhros took the hand because he was moving too far.

“Let’s go,” Fingon whispered against his skin. “The sea is waiting for us.”

Maedhros looked up at him a little pleadingly. Fingon snorted.

“Don’t be a baby. Get up, we’ll have a bit of a walk.”

Maedhros followed him slowly, out onto the strand, falling a little behind as he looked around him, at the beach and the rocks and the still-starlit sky.

Presently he heard a voice behind him, calling him.

“I thought you said you didn’t want to swim,” Elros ran up to him, smiling, and a little breathless. “You’ve changed your mind.”

“You could say that.”

Tue, 11 May 2004 18:03:20 GMT

Attention all.

This is a gratuitious icon post.

Many thanks to Beth, and Lady Jaida for the text and the picture respectively.

What? Oh, yes. The mortal wrote the words somewhere in her pseudo-epic. I believe she got poor Beth to make one for the whore lover too. She really needs to get over us.

conceals a jar in his coat pocket

Sat, 01 May 2004 14:13:04 GMT

*comes home from work*

*sets Calypso down*

Indonya? I got us a foetus.

I adopted!

List of mundane accomplishments

Wed, 28 Apr 2004 15:00:36 GMT

1. Played in "The Doors Concerto: Symphonic Rock". Greatly disturbed by original songs.
2. Cooked spaghetti for s/w lover, although I much prefer fettucini. Fed lover with own fingers.
3. Set up a jam session with second-favourite cousin, Tinks.
4. Bought the lover stuffed bear, by name Gandalf, as part of therapy to teach him to relax and just be cuddled. Teach Maedhros, i.e., not Gandalf, who probably knows nothing else.
5. Forgot to offer him a foot massage.
6. Tuned up and practised for recording of new-issue Palestrina. Discovered affinity for church music anew.
7. Got sorted:

8. Taught a female police officer where her name, Dido, really comes from. Suspect did her good as she says she suffered grievously in school by kids sticking an "l" in between.
9. Discovered meaning of "dildo".
10. Saved the world.

Funny you should ask.

Wed, 21 Apr 2004 07:06:37 GMT

The World Is MINE! by Demonac
Name:
You will conquer:	the United States of America (but their government in exile is still holding out in the Statue of Liberty's head).
Your title will be:	Prince/Princess (you didn't want to be presumptuous)
You will succeed by:	Single combat (personally walk in there and wipe them out one-by-one).
Your Enforcers will be:	Mindflayers (from D&D).
Your first act as ruler:	Spend billions on research into immortality so you can rule for ever.
(What happened after)	Try "The World Was Yours! What Happened?" MEME to find out!

Created with the ORIGINAL MemeGen!

Tue, 20 Apr 2004 16:42:58 GMT

I do believe that mortal music comes closer than any of our own elven varieties to filling in the gaps in the Great Music. To help understand, why things are the way they are.

There are times when you don't want to seek. There are times when you simply want to close your eyes and find.

Verdi's Requiem keeps playing in my head. It feels like I know what was going on in his mind when he wrote it. Things like that take on an odd poignancy when you know what it feels like to die painfully.

--

Maedhros lost his memory today. He is now a whore who does not understand why he stays young forever. Thus he keeps trying to kill himself to receive the Gift and fails.

He is a stupid whore and I love him very much.

Fingon Unplugged

That Time In The Woods

Fic.

Well, well.

GIP.

My weapon of choice

Judging by the multiple numbers of Maedhros on my f-list...

IMPORTANT: ELF REQUEST!

GIP

Story: A Last Reckoning

Extry

*conceals a jar in his coat pocket*

List of mundane accomplishments

Funny you should ask.

conceals a jar in his coat pocket