The problem with writing in first person is sometimes things happen in a story that you cannot write about because your POV character is not there. The story "Beware the Starless Midnight" was written from Legolas and Eldarion's perspective so we did not see this conversation between Elladan and Elrohir and yet it is important.
As I am about to start a more Elladan-centric storyline we need to see inside his head.
For those who do not already know...Elladan has the sea-longing. That was discussed in "Fire Dancing Upon Our Souls."
The title for this comes from a quote by Helen Keller
"Walking with a friend in the dark is better than walking alone in the light."
Elladan
My brother and I are the same but different.
To the outside eye we are identical. Mortals struggle to tell us apart and only those who know us very well can do it easily.
But inside we are different and our Elven friends and family, those who see beyond our faces to feel our very souls, cannot understand how anyone could possibly confuse us.
It has always been so. Outside the same; inside different.
I am Elladan; calm and quiet, careful and thoughtful. He is Elrohir; turbulent, outspoken, short-tempered.
He is my voice . . . Has been so since our childhood, and I am his control.
When we were small and something happened to upset me, when some terribly important wrong was visited upon me, it was Elrohir who attacked on my behalf. It was him who put his head over the parapet when I was too quiet to argue my point.
And when his temper flared over insignificant dramas it was I who calmed him. I was the one to whisper sense to him and steer him on a more reasonable course.
That was how we were as children and it is how we are now.
But now I am sick of it.
For the last time I have been blamed for my brother's temper.
I am angry. I am angry at myself for I have failed my nephew, angry at my sister who has neglected to ask for my help, and angry at my foster brother for tarring me with my brothers brush. But most of all I am angry at Elrohir.
The slamming of the door behind me is a most satisfying sound.
We are alone and I turn on him.
"You have outdone yourself."
"I know. I know." He holds his hands up defensively. "I do not need a lecture from you."
"And I do not care what you need!"
He blinks at the force of my words, as I pick up the book casually lying beside the chair and hurl it across the room into the wall because, elbereth, throwing things feels so good. I am seldom this angry . . . At least for people to see. Even Elrohir does not see this.
"I am done with this, Elrohir. I am done with it."
He grasps my arm and holds it firm before I can throw anything else.
"Done with what?"
"Done with you. Done with the world seeing me as your keeper because you cannot be bothered controlling yourself. I go to visit our brother and he blames mefor the damage you have done to his son because I was not there. It is not my job to babysit you. It is not my fault your temper is uncontrollable. You are not my responsibility!"
And he takes a step back, his face shuttered and defensive.
"Well perhaps I am done with it too."
"Then stop it!"
But he did not mean that.
"Perhaps I am done with always having to fight battles . . . Some I do not even agree with . . . Because you remain silent and expect me to. Perhaps I am done with always being the one to stand up, the one others see as volatile, because you will not. Perhaps I am done with being your defender for that is not my responsibility either!"
He takes away all my words. It is not what I expected.
And so we stand and stare and say nothing.
"I did not know." When the ability to speak returns it is all I can say.
And he backs down, he blames himself as he always does.
"It does not matter. You are right. I allow myself to lose control and it is not your fault."
But it does matter. My eyes are opened to a different Elrohir I have never considered. A brother who feels he mustbe the one with a temper, he must be the one to fight.
"When I saw the boy just now. . . ." he continues, "When I saw him . . . Legolas is right, he is a child, a frightened child despite how grown he looks and I have hurt him."
And I remember that glimpse I had of Eldarion's fea when I truly looked for it. Bright, sweet, elven, but at the same time terrified, battered, and childlike as it rushed towards my light like a prisoner let out of a cage. No matter why he feels he must use his temper, no matter if some of that is my fault because I have allowed him to take that role, what Elrohir did to that boy enrages me.
"How do you think I felt, Elrohir, having to repair your damage when Estel was too upset to finish the job? And the laceration I stitched up is not the worst of it. The real damage lies within."
"Laceration? But I did not . . . I simply held him against the wall." He is horrified.
"I do not know how it happened, Elrohir. Might I suggest you threw him against the wall roughly? That you are an elven warrior and he is an untried Man and in your anger your force was excessive? Whatever . . . I know what I saw."
Elrohir's rage is a brilliant burning fury when he releases it. A fire that sets the world alight. But when it burns out he is left with remorse and self blame and that is where he sits now.
"You cannot imagine my shame, Elladan."
"Then do not let it happen again! There is no justification, Elrohir. None!"
"It felt like a betrayal." And as I watch he collapses before my eyes, sinking into the chair before me, head heavy in his hands. "I love that boy and I pay a heavy price for that love. You know that. I did not want to love him but he needed someone and it had to be me. Youwould not do it. You have been happy to allow me to bear the load of loving Eldarion. Then he hurt Legolas. After all I have done, after all it costs me. He hurt Legolas."
He is right. When Legolas, in a rage, pointed out to us the damage our distance caused the boy I was all too happy to let Elrohir take that load but here it is . . . The crux of it is Legolas. For Elrohir now it always all comes down to Legolas.
I do not resent that. I do not. All our lives I have watched him struggle with feeling not enough. Not Elven enough, not talented enough, too much like Elros, not enough like Elrond. Now in Legolas he has someone who loves all those parts of him, who thinks his Mannish tendencies special. And Elrohir's love in return is an incandescent thing. As fiercely bright as his rage can be so is his love. I rejoice for him that he has that.
But I am lonely.
Always it has been Elladan and Elrohir. Now for Elrohir it is Elrohir and Legolas and I circle on the outside. Even when we are just ourselves in Imladris with Legolas far away in Ithilien still Elrohir's heart is there.
And the space by my side where my twin used to be is cold.
"He is still a child, Elrohir." I tell him. "Whatever wrong he has done you, you cannot allow yourself to rage. My absence is no excuse. I expect you to have control. Legolas expects it. No longer will I be acting as the stop upon your temper and no longer do you have fight any battles just for me. No longer will you be alone in loving Eldarion either."
For I can avoid it no longer, I have to bond with that boy. I cannot turn my back on him and ignore him now. I have no other options. He has no one else.
If my sister had used the sense she was born with and come to me for help all those years ago at his birth she could have done it. She could have steered his Elven soul gently as he grew. But instead she has suffocated it and it is no good now, looking at her to help. I doubt he will accept it from her.
It is not that I do not love Eldarion. I do. But I do not want to know him. I cannot bear another loss, another bright, shining boy gone forever. I cannot do it.
But now I must.
And the day I can finally follow the call of the sea which roars louder and louder in my ears every day, is delayed yet again. No longer will it be when my sister leaves us. If I mentor this boy I must stay and help him find his feet. But I will not stay until the end—I swear it. I will not watch another die. This time it will be I who leaves. When he is secure upon his throne I will be the one who chooses to depart.
The weight of every one of those extra days I must now remain crushes me. It presses down on my soul and the sea screams out its rage that I deny it.
Suddenly I am too tired to talk to my brother, too weary to stand here and see his love for Legolas shine from his eyes. A love I do not have.
I turn my back on him.
"Where do you go?" He is anxious, but then he always is. He needs me to calm him but I have no calmness left.
"To see Legolas. To try and repair him for you. Stay here and think, Elrohir."
I open the door and walk away.
"Elladan," he calls after me as I stride down the hall, "are you well?"
"I am well."
It is what I tell them all.
But the truth it is not.
.