AN: I'm going to try updates on the 1st of each moth, with sporadic ones in between.

Glorfindel's hands had gone white quite a while ago, and now they were into the stage of numbness where he felt a thousand tiny needles swimming in his bloodstream. The rusted handles of the now-extinguished lanterns dug lines into his palms. The rain was long gone; it had left sometime in the hour-long walk back to Imladris. The other members of the search party had rejoined them along the way, each saying nothing of their findings—a shake of the head was more than enough. They'd all split off to their separate ways, and now Glorfindel and Edlendaer were once ago alone, boots clipping on the roads of Imladris. The rain had cleared, and the sun was shining, peaking through the tattering clouds of the sky. Even it seemed to be solemn.

Edlendaer was beside him, the human unconscious in his arms. The elf still refused to talk to him, even really acknowledge him in any way. He sighed. There'd be a break between his sworn-family and him for more than a century, one that became bitterly obvious for days afterward whenever Elenhach was spoken of.

"Do you have a plan, Lord Glorfindel?" he asked coldly. The elf-lord flinched at the tone.

"I was hoping to find our human here an empty cot in the Healing Wing," he returned evenly.

"Look around, Lord Glorfindel," Edlendaer nearly spat, "if you find an empty corner in the Healing Wing, I'll count us blessed."

The lord stopped, eyes flashing.

"Alright, that is enough!" His fingers were trembling. "If you have something to say to me, then say it!"

"This is not the time nor the place," his sworn-nephew replied stiffly, staring straight ahead, back to the lord.

"And why is that?" he nearly growled, angry that, whenever he brought up the tension between them, his nephew would deflect until he had a chance to escape.

"Why is that—" Edlendaer spun on his heels to look at him, emerald eyes sharp as daggers. "We are surrounded by the burning homes of our people! Corpses lie at our feet, both orcish and elvish alike! Blood has stained our boots, and lifeless eyes watch us at this very moment!"

"What better time to repair a bond then when death reminds us why we should?" the lord tried, voice hitching.

His nephew watched him, almost in disbelief, and Glorfindel himself wasn't sure why he was pushing the issue now. His flimsy excuse barely explained the stupid timing.

"I have many things to say to you," Edlendaer finally replied, stalking forward with the grace of a cat, "many, many things—words that would render my tongue barely cleaner than that of an orc's, insults that are so foul they have never been spoken and were created instead in the depths of my own mind. What kind of elf…" his face twisted. "I could care less what personal opinion you have of my strange, beautiful, little brother but to say them—and, what more—to say them as I grieve my wonderfully brave older brother, is nothing short of despicable."

"Pretending to go along with her delusion for her mental health when she was alive is one thing," Glorfindel said with eyes as deadest as a Maia's, "defending it when she is long dead is another. Perhaps, I was tactless, and, for that, I beg your pardon, but do not dare use your grief as a weapon to insist I am wrong." It was a mistake when he added, "I mourn them both, just as you do."

"You've lost a brother before, Glorfindel, haven't you?" Edlendaer snarled, heels digging into the ground. The lord's breath caught. He didn't dare… "Ecthelion of the Fountain." The word floated off his tongue like a thorn, like a sharpened blade, like a knife buried in his heart. It was half-taunt and half-growl, and both were so unlike his sworn-nephew that Glorfindel felt a certain worry grow in his stomach, a seed surviving the burning rage. "Remember how you wept, remember that deep ache in your soul, and dare tell me that you will miss either Elrînnaur or Elrohir more than I do! They were my brothers, heart and soul and bond, and I have every right to defend them to my dying breath! And, if there is one thing you should know about me by now, uncle, is that I will."

With that, his nephew turned back and walked to the healing wing. It wasn't at a run, but it wasn't a normal pace either. Glorfindel, a thread of shame burning in his stomach, followed a few paces behind. He tried to distract himself from the fires around him, ignore the Hûharu sneaking up his shoulders.

He was breathing hard by the time they reached the halls, but not from exhaustion. At least… not physical exhaustion. The lord placed the two lanterns on an empty wall ledge and glanced around the room, letting himself finally take in what had happened when the dawn broke just that morning.

The dead were being laid out on balconies, and there were so many that corpses had started to sneak into the hallways. All of them were bloody, ranging from stab wounds that had killed them nearly instantly, to those who had bled out as fires burned around, their clothes soaked with red. Some were warriors, dressed still in armor, blood leaking out of their mouths. But most were civilians, some with tools of their trade still clipped to their belts.

He knew all of them.

Each and every one.

Silivren, the silver-haired ellyth widow with two children.

Fendel, the father of six daughters and a beautiful son.

Naurwen, a woodcutter, her own ax buried in her chest.

And so many others, some adults and some elflings nowhere near their majority.

The wounded had run out of private rooms and now spilled out to join their dead companions in the halls. A few chairs and cots had been dragged out for those more gravely injured, but most had been given nothing more than a blanket and told to lie on the floor. Healers were stretched thin, their tired eyes looking out blearily around them. Exhaustion came from their every move. Yet, they walked along the lines, stitching up the wounds of the dead to make them presentable for burial, speaking in soothing tones to the injured, passing out water to those who had lost their homes and were now shivering on the floor, curled up in threadbare sheets. An ellon near Glorfindel caught the arm of a passing young healer, an apprentice's blue sash still tied around her white tunic and begged for something to eat. She handed him an apple, its sides half caved in from age, which he devoured as though it was to be his last meal on Arda.

I'm sorry," he heard her whisper, "that's all I have," before rushing off to attend someone else.

The usually white walls and floor of the Healing Halls were now red, blood still seeping into cracks. Some had congealed, sticking to the floor in clumps. The rest slipped into fabric, slowly turning it maroon. Glorfindel's boots, already stained by mud from the rain, were given splashes of blood across the leather.

"Time to find a corner for our friend," the lord said in a detached voice.

"No, my lord Glorfindel" Edlendaer replied, voice clear and formal. His emerald eyes were alight and burning. There was a hitch in his voice, a shudder. "I will go and speak to my father. I must bring in him news of our search."

There was a darkness in his gaze, a heavy and still sorrow. Glorfindel didn't question it. Edlendaer and he had never been close, even before Elenhach's death, for reasons he had known almost since they'd met. The ellon's father could help him in the first throes of his new, raw grief more than his distant sworn-uncle ever could.

The lord nodded.

"I'll try and find a place for our friend—somewhere away from the crowds as to not scare him when he awakes and secluded enough that we can watch him without bothering others with our presence," he spilled out quietly in a single breath, barely aware he was speaking aloud his thoughts. Glorfindel took the man gently from Edlendaer, supporting his head in the crook of his elbow, short hair tousled against the fabric of his sleeves. His nephew's fingers were twitching uncomfortably now, as though he didn't know what to do with them. He eventually settled his left hand on his sword, and, without a word, turned and stalked away.

The lord sighed, watching Edlendaer's form fold into the crowds of elves like his body instinctively knew how to vanish without a second thought.

He glanced down at the man in his arms and was reminded, once again, how tall he was. Six-foot, at least, but Glorfindel would bet even taller. His hair was a beautiful shade of raven black, any inky color you rarely saw. His skin was darker than even an Avari's, and the short glance he saw of those green eyes told him that the man, covered in travel-worn clothes and with the lines of more than a few blades, was still crowned in beauty, despite the scars that crawled up his neck and wrists.

He sighed. The darkness left nothing untouched, did it?

Translations:

Hûharu: Soul-wound (a wound that leaves a deep enough impact on the spirit that it bleeds its way into the body, even after the original injury has faded)