"So," Elrond finally said after a long silence. He rolled a glass of miruvor on the surface of the desk and twiddled a dip pen in the other hand. The blank parchment in front of him glared a pale accusation from the dark surface of his desktop, "What do we tell King Thranduil?"
"The truth?" Glorfindel suggested, he had his golden hair unbraided in a gesture of mourning, and it seemed to glow in the firelight.
"How much of the truth?" Elrond spun his pen between his fingers. A single stitch, like a small and patient spider, held closed the cut on his cheek. It was shiny with some healing salve but otherwise undressed.
"The truth he needs to know," the commander suggested, "that the power at his Southern border has grown both strong and devious." He took a sip of his own glass. The clear liquor caught the glow of the fire.
Elrond took a deep breath and closed his eyes, "she came in here with Elladan's blood on her hands, Mellon nín." He clutched the pen in his fist upon the desktop.
"And you," Glorfindel frowned at his old friend, "chose the course of empathy."
"I knew something was wrong with her," Elrond shook his head, "but I did not want to intrude. I saw my own pain in her because that is what I wanted to see." His hand shook, and the pen snapped in half.
The Balrog slayer nodded, watching his friend in sympathy. He wondered how long it had been since he had rested.
"I should have known," Elrond admonished himself, looking regretfully at the two halves of the broken tool. It had been a yeni old antique, like most of the things in the study, beautifully sculpted to fit his own hand out of mithril and boxwood.
Glorfindel folded his arms at the edge of the desk and studied the fine lines of weariness at the corner of his lord's eyes. "As we should have known with Maeglin."
"Ai," Elrond winced, "I had hoped to have learned better from the mistakes of my forebearers." He lifted the sweet liquor to his mouth but put it back down without drinking.
"Perhaps you have," Glorfindel leaned back, studying the painting of Earendil over the hearth before looking back to his friend, "but so has the enemy."
Elrond placed the two halves of the broken instrument snugly together so that it created the illusion that it was whole. "To use the love of a bonded pair for these wicked ends…" his voice was thick with emotion as he looked at the golden warrior, lounging like a large and dangerous cat across the wooden chair, "could I have…" he couldn't bring himself to voice his thoughts. What would he give up to hear her voice again?
"Iston was not Celebrian," Glorfindel spoke earnestly, "and you, my lord, are not King Turgon. What would you have done had she been captured alive? Thrown her from the Great Falls?"
"She might still have…" Elrond started, but the Golden Warrior cut him off.
"My lord, you did not see her face." He folded his hands together on the edge of the desk. "It was all an act designed specifically for you. Her destination was never the Havens. She was a weapon and nothing more, do not burden yourself with her fate."
Elrond watched his seneschal's gaze. His blue eyes burned with concern. "I wonder when it was that she lost herself?" he asked, bringing the glass to his lips and actually drinking this time. "ai, Eru." He shook his head, "do I know so little about what goes on in my own home?"
Just then, a shy knock came at the door. Elrond looked knowingly at the commander, drained his glass, set it aside, and nodded. Glorfindel immediately rose and went to the door. He opened it, and Finbaran presented himself. To one who did not know the doctor, the signs of his grief would be subtle. His deep brown hair was unbraided and hung neatly brushed upon his shoulders and down to his knees. His body was drawn taught as if he was balancing on a tightrope, and he looked at Elrond like he was Mandos himself.
"Leave us, commander." The Lord of Imladris ordered Glorfindel, who nodded politely and stepped outside. "Take a seat, Master Tentaluntë." Elrond nodded towards the place that Glorfindel had just vacated. The master healer took the seat with a nod. Finbaran began to open his mouth to say something, but his voice became stuck in his throat.
"I wanted to thank you." Elrond began.
"My Lord?" the surgeon stammered.
"Your ingenuity saved my son's life." He said evenly, then glanced meaningfully at the door, "Some may not approve of your methods, but I have seen their efficacy and would like to support your research." Finbaran blinked at his lord. This was not what he had expected.
"Have you spoken with Lord Erestor, sir?" Finbaran asked, certain that something would have been left out.
"Erestor is fond of fairy stories. Our Dwarvish friend was too occupied with that rock you gifted him to remember anything else, by your design, I imagine," he rolled his eyes at the master healer, "and the wizard will tell me nothing," Elrond shrugged, "Whatever," his voice became suddenly dark, "or whomever, you had down there, will remain buried, do you understand me?" the air crackled between them.
"Yes, my lord." The Master healer nodded to the younger elf.
"Good," the lord of Imladris smiled and leaned back. He produced two clean glasses and the decanter of floral liquor, which he placed on the desktop. Finbaran's eyes went round as he poured two generous glasses. Finbaran had always been a very proper elf. He had been made to understand, that however intimate he might become with nobility, he would always occupy the role of a servant. It had been many yeni since one of his string of ill-fated lords had behaved so casually. He suspected an ulterior motive.
"But that is not your only secret, is it, Master Tentaluntë?" Elrond narrowed his eyes at the Master healer, "With one hand thou givest, with thine left only," he quoted the Noldalantë, "Open thy right hand." Elrond handed him a glass, "how did you become deaf, Master Tentaluntë?"
Finbaran choked into his glass, then took a deep swig of the cloying sweet liquor and tried to pretend that he had not heard the question.
"My lord?" he blinked and smiled and tried to look perplexed.
"You did not hear the bottles falling," Elrond gestured with his glass, "which several people found suspicious, and when someone, I won't say who," he raised one eyebrow, "outright accused you of stabbing my son for the sake of experimentation, through the very thin surgery doors, you did not react in the slightest." The Master Healer had frozen, one hand clutched around his glass, but Elrond went on, "I admit, when Mithrandir told me that you could communicate in Iglishmêk, I was impressed and a bit jealous, but after Elladan was attacked, I started asking myself why one would need such a skillset. For, including our dear young guest, I have never met a dwarf who did not prefer to speak our language than teach us theirs. Then I remembered," he gestured with his glass. He was extremely tired, and he felt as if he had been holding his deduction inside of him for a lifetime, "that dwarves do not possess the talents of the mind which are the native faculties of our own people." He leaned forward, peering at the surgeon carefully, looking for a sign of confirmation. "You aren't listening to me with your ears, are you, Master Tentaluntë?" their eyes fixed across the desktop, the broken pen between them.
"I'm not completely deaf," Finbaran said after a long moment. His voice was barely a whisper. "I can hear screams," his gaze flickered to the high rafters, and the fire crackled in the hearth and reflected in his eyes, "and, and other loud noises. I have become rather skilled with lipreading, except for the Edain, who grow such monstrous whiskers that I can neither see their faces nor hear their thoughts." He held the glass close to his body.
"And you did not simply think to tell us?" Elrond raised his hands in exasperation, "was the girl's life worth this prideful stubbornness?"
The Master healer's eyes snapped shut, "I…" he stammered, "I swore…"
"What did you swear that would come before your loyalty to this valley and your lord?" Elrond snapped. "Is your physical imperfection so shameful that whatever you had going on in my basement was a small matter to trade for it?" he leaned in on his elbows. "It is my right to know what oaths you have sworn, Ataxo."
Finbaran laughed, "Ai, my lord," he said nervously and looked to the windows and the doors as if some creeping eavesdropper might appear over the balcony railing. He stood, draining his glass and placing his drink on one of the coasters that Glorfindel had not used. He went to the high windows and drew the curtains away from the great brass hooks that held them open and blocked out the winter evening. Elrond watched him with mild curiosity as the doctor circled the study and returned to his seat. He invited him to continue with a shrug. But Finbaran did not speak. He did the very last thing that Elrond expected.
With a practiced motion, Finbaran placed his thumbnail at the corner of his false eye and flipped it out into his palm. He placed it into the crystal glass that he had just drained, and the light from the gem burst in shining rainbow patterns upon the walls and the ceiling. The study was filled with sublime radiance.
Elrond felt his jaw fall open and the glass of liquor fall from his hand to thud onto the carpet and roll lazily into the shadows.
"Put it back." Was all he could think to say as the brightness of the jewel left trails in his vision. A moment later, the study was again plunged into what seemed like a deeper darkness than ever before.
Finbaran sat patiently with his hands in his lap. He could hear Elrond's breathing. The Master healer was, outwardly, the perfect representation of every other dark-haired and grey-eyed, thinly built but taller than average Noldorin tradesman.
"He called it the henmiril. It was a prototype," he began, and Elrond had no doubt who he was, "a lesser gem, smaller in size, and less radiant than my lord's later work, but still perhaps, unique."
Elrond filled the Master Healer's cup eagerly. "Did you lose your hearing at the same time that you lost your eye?"
"'twas a…" Finbaran glanced around, and Elrond, watching his gaze carefully, marveled at how the false eye seemed to move and track with his real one, "A laboratory accident, my lord. In Tirion, before the first age of the sun. We were experimenting with light-emitting and retaining materials." Finbaran took his drink, sipping it thoughtfully and replacing it on the coaster. "Which can, of course, be temperamental. I wanted to create light displays for festival days to please my lady Varda and set the skies to shine at the mingling of the lights of the trees. I shared the trick with kindly Olorin, who seemed to find the whole process fascinating." Finbaran laughed, and there was a wave of compressed memory that rode upon the healer's words, the sadness of a long life and a nearly forgotten innocence.
"Lord Atarincë found me; half my face blasted away. As you can imagine, the prince was overwrought with guilt," Finbaran swirled the liquor in his cup, "he gave me the stone as a blessing… and then the lights went out. Of the great gems wrought of old in the days before the darkening, only one survived in our possession, locked away where no one would suspect." Finbaran winked. "He put no flowery language into the oath that he made me swear. I was a subject, not a son, there were but two conditions, keep it secret, keep it safe." He sipped the miruvor, "I do not keep my condition private out of vanity, my lord." Elrond watched the old healer's face, and a wave of memories threatened to drown him. A wedding in a garden. A jeweler's workbench. Children being scolded for playing around the feet of carved statues. Lights bursting in a thousand shades of radiance upon the tree-lit heavens, An elleth with the sea in her silver hair. The flicker of firelight on steel. A world gone silent and dark except for screaming and an endless field of stars uninterrupted by the counting of the sun or moon.
Elrond recoiled from the intensity of emotion.
"I can tell you all this because of who you are by birth," he went on "You carry the authority of my lord Maethros, but I pray you speak of this to none. Only let me serve your house as I have always done." Finbaran folded his hands and bowed his head as if awaiting judgment.
"Finbaran," Elrond asked earnestly, "When was the last time you left the Valley?"
Tentaluntë looked up, his eyebrows raised, "what's that, my lord?" he thought about the question, counted something on his fingers, and answered, "During The War, sir." He nodded, blinking.
"I assume," Elrond rolled his eyes as subtly as he could manage, "that by 'The War' you mean…"
"Yes, sir."
"You have not left the Valley in this Third Age of the sun?" he asked with genuine concern in his tone.
"No, sir."
The lord of Imladris put down his glass and dragged his hands over his face. He studied the old healer in wonder and bemusement for a long moment when something Mithrandir-like awakened in him, and his expression became mischievous. "Well, my dear doctor," he drained the last of the cordial, "I think that it's time you went on an adventure."
"What's that, my lord?" The color drained from Tentaluntë's already pale face.
"According to Mithrandir, there are refugees from Erabor trying to settle in the Blue Mountains. I plan on sending them aid as a gesture of goodwill from our people since, I doubt, they received succor at the gates of the Woodland Realm. In a week when Elladan is well, I intend to send Elrohir with warriors, food for the winter, and of course, medical personnel up North."
Finbaran did not know how to react. He started by closing his mouth, "My lord?" was all he could make himself say.
"And when you return, as a personal gift for saving my son's life, you will have a fully equipped laboratory with windows and everything." He raised his eyebrows, and the master healer chuckled nervously. "That is all." He dismissed the healer, who still seemed to be in a state of shock as he stood, bowed, and dashed for the door.
Elrond separated the two halves of the broken pen upon the desktop. Standing up and stretching his neck, he listened to the familiar sounds of the house settling. Someone was walking in the upstairs corridor, and the dying fire hissed. He parted the curtains Finbaran had closed and looked out from the East facing window. The light of his father's star fell soft and cool upon his face.