When Elrond gets home, the house is empty except for Lindir.
At least, it's supposed to be. Ella's out with his latest boyfriend (Elrond thinks his name might be Orophin), Roh's studying at the library, and Erestor and Glorfindel are in Bodega Bay, probably at the beach. So it should just be him and Lindir.
But when Elrond walked through the door there was piano music playing, and to the best of his knowledge nobody has ever programmed Lindir to do that.
He shuts the front door behind him and the piano stops. Elrond stands perfectly still and perfectly silent, listening; there's a rustle of papers — sheet music — and forty-two paces of precise, even footsteps before Lindir stands before him, hands clasped behind his back.
"Hello. How may I help you?" Lindir's voice is polite but toneless, face as blank as a china doll's.
Well, at least he'd left off the "sir" this time. "I didn't know you played piano," Elrond says. "Who taught you?"
He didn't mean it as an accusation, just a question. But Lindir instinctively flinches away, raises both arms to cover his head and whimpers, which would worry Elrond the most if it weren't for the litany of "I'm sorry, I'm sorry" that pours from his lips.
Elrond waits for the boy — two minutes ago he would've said "the robot" but not now, not anymore — to calm down, and when Lindir does, hesitantly lowering his arms, he says, "Don't apologize for talent, Lindir."
He's still shaking, very slightly but it means he's still scared. "That's not what Cassius said," Lindir whispers, and Elrond's heart shatters.
"Cassius Owen was wrong," he says, more harshly than he meant to, and Lindir fliches away again, though arms stay wrapped around his waist this time and he's silent. Elrond catches himself and says, gentler now, "I'm sorry." Lindir looks up at him with so much confusion that Elrond can't help but wonder just how bad it was for the boy. "It isn't you I'm angry with," he offers as way of explanation.
Lindir watches him carefully again, but doesn't say anything — just nods and leaves, footsteps less even than before.
Elrond takes a deep breath, braces himself, and follows.
He doesn't understand why Elrond cares so much.
They've already given him more than he ever dreamed of when he lived with Cassius: a home. He's never hungry here, and never cold, and when they first purchased him from Cassius he wasn't threatened and lectured but welcomed in with opened arms.
He receives more affection than he could ever ask for as well: Glorfindel gives out warm smiles like they're candy on Halloween (or at least, how he imagines Halloween; Cassius hated the holiday and kept him inside), Erestor curls up next to him on the couch ("Living with Erestor is like having a giant kitten in the house," Elrond said with a laugh when he saw them the next morning), the twin laugh and run around and touch him when they aren't thinking about it (Roh's hand on his shoulder is the warmest thing he's ever willingly touched), and even Elrond is sitting next to him now, making small soothing sounds and holding him close.
And he can't figure out why, because Elrond and his family have given him everything, and all he's repayed them with is a broken machine and a servant who doesn't know his place.
"Lindir." Elrond's voice is soft, his breath warm on Lindir's cheeks. "You're crying again." He moves so that their foreheads brush, "please, tell me what's wrong. I can't help you if I don't know."
Lindir tries to explain, tries to work his way through the seventeen years he spent in Cassius's house, but all he manages is another sob. He hates himself for it — he's a robot, a machine, a hunk of scrap metal designed to serve and only to serve. He isn't meant to feel, and he hates how little control he has.
But if he can't articulate how it was with Cassius (he unconsciously cradles his right hand), he certainly can't articulate that. So he doesn't try, instead leaning closer into Elrond's strength and letting himself cry.