DISCLAIMER: Tolkien is still the proud owner of all characters in this fic, and as a gift, he can even have Lothvaen's wife too. Lothvaen (a.k.a. Figwit) belongs to the fandom in general.

WARNING: Slashiness! (and Erestor torture -- at least, for him it's torture)

Chapter Four: Bathing Woes

Erestor's robes flapped intimidatingly -- or so he thought -- as he strode purposefully down Glorfindel's corridor. He had never been able to fathom why all of Elrond's highest-ranking advisors were housed miles apart from one another. Glorfindel and Erestor for example, both occupied the West Wing, it was true. Unfortunately, Glorfindel was tucked into the most southern south corner of the West Wing, while Erestor was comfortably north, much closer to the rest of the Last Homely House. Bloody long trek in-between.

In fact, Erestor rather thought he would much prefer the side Glorfindel lived in to his own. Glorfindel's area of The House happened to face the waterfalls, while he, Erestor, was roomed next to Lothvaen, and his lady. They were a fairly new couple, and very much in love.

Poor Erestor was well aware of this, as they made their declarations known fairly frequently. This made sleeping difficult most nights. No, scratch that -- every night. In any case, Erestor much preferred the other side of the Last Homely House. The corridors down by Glorfindel's rooms were decorated with pictures of great cities of the first age -- the Havens of Sirion, and there was Vinyamar, and Gondolin before the sacking. The noise of the distant waterfall was also a lovely accompaniment to the sound of loud, bawdy singing-- wait.

Erestor stopped short, about one hundred yards away from Glorfindel's door. Bawdy singing? Usually, the only bawdy songs heard in Imladris came from various visiting Dúnedain.

But this . . . this was coming from Glorfindel's rooms. Erestor inched closer, and listened harder.

Oh, no. Not that song. Anything but that one. If anybody else should hear it. . . . Well. The ensuing gossip and loss of dignity would be on the whole undesirable -- for Glorfindel, at least.

A true friend would stop him, ignoring the possibility for pranks. And who was Erestor, if not a true friend?

Erestor sprinted the rest of the way to his friend's door, which he knew would not be locked. Glorfindel never locked his doors. He threw it open dramatically, then navigated his way carefully through the mess that was Glorfindel's study. He inched through the doorway, then paused to listen. The sound was coming from a chamber off of the bedroom. Erestor drew a deep breath as he made his way to the door

"Lord Glorfindel, what on Arda -- eep." The door to the chamber was not shut.

It was a bath chamber. Erestor had walked in on Lord Glorfindel in the bath.

Why do the Valar hate me? Glorfindel's head was resting on the wall behind him and his extremely muscled chest was fully out of the water. His arms were cushioning his head, and his eyes were shut lazily with long lashes covering them as he sang his -- extremely bawdy -- song. Oh, no. Thankfully, the bath was full of bubbles, ensuring that, should Erestor chance to look -- no. We shall not explore that mind track.

Glorfindel's eyes flew open, and he sat straight up. "Ai -- Erestor!" He sat back, letting out a long breath. Apparently the old warrior was not expecting to be startled in the bathtub. Perhaps he would from now on. Erestor would probably be forever on his guard also. He grimaced.

"Do you need something from me, Erestor?" With a sheer lack of modesty that set poor Erestor blushing from the base of his neck to the tips of his ears, Glorfindel stood up, stretched, and awarded Erestor a lovely view of his backside while turning around to wipe his face on a convenient hand towel.

"Er," stammered the normally well-composed Elf, "er, ah, the song. . . ."

"Yes, don't you like it? You remember when that young injured Dúnadan taught it to my patrol -- what was his name? Sigilmir?" Glorfindel turned back around and grinned hugely. Erestor was struck dumb.

There were no bubbles now to hide the view -- but by the strength of will of his mother, Erestor would not look down.

"Lovely th-- er, lovely, Glorfindel. I -- ah --" Glorfindel really did have lovely thighs . . . don't look down! "-- ah, wanted to s-- that is, to apologize, I really do n--" DON'T LOOK DOWN! "--that is, I really did not need to, that is. . . ." Erestor glared at the other Elf, but to his horror, felt his eyes drifting irrescapably downward. Worse, Glorfindel seemed completely unabashed by it all. He flipped his hair over one shoulder and gathered it together with a towel.

Erestor regained his ability to speak, at least temporarily. "Glorfindel, it is. . . ." By Elbereth! Can you not keep your eyes and thoughts decent? ". . . .very distracting. . . ." It cannot be this hard! ". . . .to speak toyoulikethis!"

And with that, he turned around and rushed out of the room. Even the back of his neck was smarting red.

Glorfindel paused in the act of drying his long golden hair to stare after the retreating elf as he tripped over several piles of who-knew-what laying around on Glorfindel's rather untidy study. "Erestor, you seem to get stranger by the day," he muttered to himself, as Erestor went sprawling. He shook his head, and stepped all the way out of the bathtub.

"Erestor . . . are you all right?" he asked concernedly. He strode into the room, and peered at the other elf. Erestor's long black hair was splayed out over his back, and he was facedown on the floor. Glorfindel knelt in front of him to help him up.

Erestor's eyes widened. This is most definetly not my day, he thought mournfully. Then, he realized that Glorfindel was still very naked. Still very naked and kneeling in front of him. The Valar really must be angry at me for something, because I cannot think of any reason why-- Ai! Whomever taught modesty practices to Glorfindel was obviously not paying much attention to his progress! This then sparked an image of a young warrior Glorfindel continually running around whatever dwelling he lived in -- in the nude. Where is he from, anyway?

"Erestor?" Glorfindel questioned again.

Erestor let loose a lovely stream of dwarvish curses mostly concerning Glorfindel, his study, Glorfindel, and the state of his mental immagery in general. When he was through, Glorfindel looked at him, fairly impressed.

"I was not aware that you could speak thus," he told Erestor with a touch of admiration in his voice. "I only understood about half of what you said." He glanced around his study with a wistful expression. "Is it really that bad?"

"Yes," growled the advisor who was still facedown on the floor -- and not planning to sit up any time soon! "You ought to clean up. Organize, Glorfindel -- does that penetrate?"

"I had been thinking that you came here to apologize or something similar to that," Glorfindel told him pointedly. "At least, that was the impression I got when you startled me in the bath."

This of course reminded Erestor of Glorfindel's current state of dress -- not that he had ever really forgotten completely. In retrospect, this was not a good thing, because Erestor blushed again. Then his blush deepened because of the previous blush. Had it not involved lifting his head, Erestor would have banged his head against the floor. Hard. Several times. He really had no dignity left to loose at this point anyway.

Glorfindel watched him closely. "You really need to work on your blush control," he told Erestor matter-of-factly as well as fairly unhelpfully. "I suppose being locked in the study all day makes you allergic to body form. We warriors bathe together quite often, you know."

Indignation conquered humility, and Erestor looked Glorfindel square in the eye and said hotly, "I was a warrior for many years, you know! I fought at Dagorlad and the battles preceeding it -- in fact, you commanded me --" Glorfindel snorted.

"And how many hundreds of years ago was that?" Silence on Erestor's front.

"I . . . did not especially enjoy it, Glorfindel. But it was needful, so I did my duty. Not like you brash barbarians who ride around kicking up mud and swinging sharp pointy things at each other all day."

Glorfindel laughed outright. "You were very good. It is a shame. But you ought to train with us more often, perhaps -- civilize us a bit."

"Perhaps so. But not today." He drew a deep breath, and said evenly, "I apologize, Glorfindel, for shouting at you in a manner unseemly for an advisor. I had no right. I am sorry," he finished with an outrush of breath.

Glorfindel nodded slowly. "I accept your apology and extend my own, Lord Erestor, for questioning against your wishes. Though I do wish you would tell me what the problem was."

"It is in the past."

"Indeed." There was an awkward silence, which Glorfindel broke after several moments. "We really are quite stupid sometimes, are we not?"

Erestor let out a short laugh, that seemed to only make the situation more awkward. "I believe," he added after a moment, "I believe that they believe we hate each other very much." Summoning great strength of will, he sat up. Glorfindel stood and extended a hand to Erestor, who was once and for all not looking down. He took the offered hand and pulled himself up.

Glorfindel was strangely reluctant to release Erestor's hand. Instead, he let go and clasped his forearm in a warrior's handshake. They met each other's eyes, and then Erestor well and truly turned and left with dignity.

-------

Supper that night was extremely informative, on some fronts. On others, it was amusing, but for some it was downright embarrassing.

It all began when an elfling -- a child whom Erestor had had his eye on as a future pupil for quite some time now -- tapped him on the shoulder. He looked down into serious eyes. "Hello, pen-neth. Is there something you would like to tell me?"

The child looked back up at him and smiled, an inncoent smile. Erestor was immediatly filled with foreboding. He was reminded uncomfortably of two other former elflings -- both of whom were now grinning identical evil grins from across the table at this very moment. Beside them sat Lindir, the equally evil minstrel, whose grin was even wider, if that was even possible.

"Master Erestor," the elfling began, slowly. He looked over his shoulder for a moment, and Erestor was alarmed to see Lindir nod encouragingly.

"Yes?" Erestor asked, dreading the impending question.

"I wanted to know . . ." he looked a little nervous, then stood up taller and spoke loud enough for the whole table to hear. "I want to know if you really do blush that color." This last part he finished with a rush, and pointed across the table at Lothvaen's wife, who was wearing a bright scarlet dress, that Erestor in his plain robes found slightly painful on the eyes.

All the way at the other end of the table, Glorfindel's fork dropped with a clunk, and Elrond choked on his wine.

Erestor stared accusingly at Lindir. "Tell me you did not -- did not --" he stabbed viciously at a piece of venison, which skidded off his plate and sent sauce flying, "-- ah -- never mind."

Elrohir leaned across the table conspiritually. "Do go on, Erestor. Was Lindir supposed to have heard anything, perchance?"

"No! Of course not! And anyway, the idea is perposterous. I do not blush." This last sentance was fairly shouted. Half of the hall looked up curiously. Glorfindel snorted. Elrond could see Lindir descreetly slipping under the table and handing something to the proud elfling, who seemed to think he'd said something immesurably funny. Beaming, the child trotted back to his parents with a cheery wave at Erestor, who was wondering why he had ever come to this meal in the first place. I should have paid atention to the omens of bad happening that were already occuring and just remained in my study -- or better yet, in bed.

Just when he thought it couldn't get at all worse, it did.

From a distance, it seemed, he heard Elrond intone, "Glorfindel, do you know anything about this?" Then Erestor couldn't help it. He did something incredibly stupid. He stood up, knocking his chair over, and shouted loud enough for everyone to hear:

"NO!"

Silence.

Then, someone began to giggle. And to laugh. Within seconds the whole hall was positively roaring with laughter, especially those who had only moments before heard Erestor tell them heatedly that he did not blush.

Because Erestor, to his eternal shame, was blushing exactly the color Lothvaen's honored lady's dress.

Why me? Erestor thought morosely. There was only one thing left to do, which would barely save his increasingly low amount of dignity. He turned around, glowered at the collective hall in general, and -- almost tripping over his chair, but remaining upright all the same -- he swept out of the hall, with his robes billowing behind him.

Elrond looked at Glorfindel and raised an eyebrow. "Well, do you?"

"No," said Glorfindel with a perfectly straight face. He downed his full glass of miruvor and filled it again. "Not a clue."

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Authors' notes:

Narthoron's Author's Notes: Yay! Another chapter completed! Actually two, but we're making you wait for that. Thanks for all of the reviews. You are wonderfully kind people who put up with our slow updates. Eithelien wrote most of this chapter -- most notable among her actions, was the description of Glorfindel that had both of us drooling. It's a scary place when the you drool at the description your own friend wrote, isn't it?

Eithelien's Author's Notes: So, so, so sorry to make you wait so long! It's my fault, really: I have no Internet anymore, so any work we do has to be done at Narthoron's computer. A weekend trip to the Coast was just what we needed, though, and it proved extremely productive.