Chasing Mirages by Russandol

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Mairon

Eönwë answers Mairon’s message.

 

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27. Mairon

 

The tree inside the hall? I frowned, puzzled, until I recalled the large, colourful tapestry of a tree at night, covered in a myriad of silver leaves, with birds nesting on its branches.

I hastened to reach the main wing and leapt down the wide staircase to the hall. The dull roar of a hundred lively conversations hit me when I opened one of the side doors. I scanned the crowd until my gaze settled on the purple-clad figure I sought; my heart drummed faster. Mairon stood at the very location he had specified, next to the tree trunk woven in golden thread, talking to a group of people I did not recognise.

He did not even look at me but somehow knew of my presence, because he bowed politely to his companions and began to walk towards the exit opposite me. As I began to follow, I was startled by the sudden weight of a hand on my shoulder.

‘Erestor!’ cried Elrond merrily. He was in the company of a man and two women from the city, who returned my greeting with equally bland ones of their own. ‘You are feeling better?’

‘Yes, my lord, thank you for your concern. I thought I would go for a stroll under the stars, to clear my mind.’ I hoped he would not offer to accompany me. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Mairon had vanished. I bit a curse.

‘Good. I shall see you in the morning,’ replied Elrond after a few moments that my impatience turned into hours. ‘We have a private audience with the Lord and Lady at the second bell.‘

‘Very well, my lord,’ I mumbled. I began to bow, hopeful.

‘One more thing, Erestor.’ His frown made my heart leap to my throat. ‘Remind me in the morning to take with us the letter from...’ My dismay must have shown on my face, or perhaps it was the sigh from the taller of the two women that made him stop. ‘Never mind. Be at my chambers at the first bell and we shall make ourselves ready.’

‘As you wish, my lord.’

With a final bow of farewell I moved away, trying hard not to rush.

When I left the building and walked into the grand square, the stone paving glistened from earlier rain that had also brought an earthy taste to the air. Once I stepped beyond the dazzling lamps near the entrance, my eyes took a while to adjust to the dimness, and I peered around, searching earnestly. My anxiety turned to anticipation as I finally discerned a cloaked shadow beginning to glide away, and I followed it at a prudent distance. Although the streets seemed empty, I looked behind me often to make certain I was not being followed.

Soon we arrived at our destination. Starlight spilled through a gauze of silver clouds to outline the dark profile of a large house. Two lamps illuminated the gilded door, reached by a flight of black marble steps. After the shadow whispered a word, one of the door panes swung silently inwards, allowing his entrance. From the opposite side of the street I peered around and, satisfied about not being watched, I climbed the steps and crossed the threshold with my heart in my mouth and my loins on fire.

Even before the door had completely closed behind me, Mairon had me backed against the wall. A hand reached out to caress my face.

‘Eönwë...’ he murmured. My breath hitched with joy.

Then, without warning, he flipped me round while leaning all his weight to pin me down, and wrenched my right arm high behind my back. The side of my head crashed against the cold stone of the door jamb in a vain attempt to twist away from his hold. My loud cry of shocked protest died and my struggle ceased as soon as the sharp pressure at my throat spoke my true peril.

His warm breath tickled my ear, as did his silken voice.

‘Friend or foe, Herald?’

Despite feeling his hard arousal pressed against my rump, I well knew that desire would not stay his blade, or his claws with whose sharpness I was well acquainted.

‘Friend, Mairon!’ I cried, as agony racked my shoulder.

I opened my mind, showing him the memory of my enforced visit to Mandos. I shuddered as I recalled Manwë’s abandonment and Námo’s cold contempt. The clatter of a knife on the floor, twinned with the welcome loosening of the painful grip on my arm made me sigh with relief.

Mairon did not prevent me from turning to face him. I gasped at the sight. His mien was terrible, the glint in his eyes so bristling with hatred that I pressed myself back against the wall, afraid. My erection still throbbed painfully against my loincloth, despite or maybe because of the thrill of danger.

His fierce kiss was unexpected. Ravenous, deep, and wrapped in fire and iron, the sweetest taste that ever touched my tongue. His arms locked tightly over my back and shoulders, granting a crushing refuge to my long-borne loneliness. With a pounding heart and stinging eyes I yielded at first to his ardent possessiveness, but then offered battle, pushing my lips against his, thrusting and biting, while my hands sank in his hair to pull him closer to me.

Time was forgotten. The yéni that had sundered us lost all meaning during that wondrous kiss. I released his hair and traced the familiar, beloved path along his jaw, and then onwards to caress the lobes, curls and tips of his perfectly sculpted ears. His whimper inside my mouth, like that of a wounded animal, made my desire soar to scorching heights.

When we parted, I was breathless and frantic with need, but still wary. And yet, I wished to be nowhere else but there with him. My gaze was locked on his face, far more beautiful in reality than ever in my dreams.

‘Come, friend,’ he invited.

His eyes were no longer threatening; his bright smile, that of our carefree days in Kiinlúum, brought a lump to my throat. He offered me his hand; I took it and squeezed his fingers as hard as a drowning man might grip the driftwood that could save him.

‘Come,’ he repeated, pulling me away from the wall, on which I had leant for support. My legs were trembling as we climbed the stairs to his chambers.

 

He only let go off my hand when we entered his room, dark except for a row of slanted beams of pale starlight seeping through the tall windows. With a wave and a whisper of Power from Mairon, both the banked ambers in the stone hearth and several lamps flared into life, making the walls panelled in honey-coloured wood warm and welcoming.

My skin prickled with goosebumps and my nostrils filled with the scent of ozone when he invoked a mighty shield of protection. After the spell was sung to completion, he gazed at me unsmiling and I weakly nodded my approval. I was relieved Manwë had not struck yet. Maybe I was no longer watched, after yéni of compliance; maybe there was hope...

A sudden sense of irreality gripped me as my old lover sat on the edge of the bed and patted the spot next to him, like he had done so long ago when we were reconciled following his treachery. Was this yet another dream, a mere replay of beloved memories blended with longing? Would he vanish if I reached out to him?

I stepped forward. Tentatively, I caressed his face; the solid warmth of his skin made me sob with joy.

‘I am real, Eönwë,’ he said, as though reading my mind.

He lay back on the mattress, pulling me down with him, and rolled us both over so that he straddled me. I raised my hand, to touch him again, but he held my wrist.

‘Would you do something for me, my beauty, to please me?’ In his eyes shone a flame I had once been familiar with as the precursor of pain and cruelty.

‘Mairon...’ I began.

‘You will not regret it, and yet, it will...’ He licked his lips. He did not have to explain, I felt his arousal twitch against my waist.

‘I am yours,’ I answered, yielding. I meant it, despite a surge of fear tinged with a tiny shade of disappointment that our first meeting demanded my surrender. ‘Command me, Mast-.’ He hastily put his finger to my lips.

‘No, not that word. I do not want a thrall cowering in terror at my feet.’ He knotted his brow and shook his head lightly, but the shadow was brief and he soon curved his lips into a wry smile. ‘Not tonight, of all nights. And yet I dearly wish to feel you are still mine, both your body and your will.’

‘I can prove that, Mairon. Speak your wish,’ I challenged.

‘Before we begin, and unless you wish me to rip your clothes to shreds, I suggest you strip.’

He slid off my chest and sat cross-legged next to me. At once I leapt from the bed, kicked off my shoes and yanked my tunic and shirt off in one impatient move before hastily pulling down my hose along with my loincloth and socks into a tangled bundle. I blushed like a maiden when his eyes, appraising and proprietary, raked my nakedness and lingered on my erection. Without a word I lay down on the bed again, next to him. I shivered, but not from cold.

‘Beautiful. Exquisitely beautiful.’ He leant forward to kiss me, weaving his fingers gently into my hair at the top of my head. I began to kiss back, eager to taste him once more, when he moved away very slowly with a small smirk spreading on his face. I moaned in frustration as the pull on my scalp held my head in place, unable to follow his mouth.

‘Whatever I do to you, do not touch me, and do not spill without my leave,’ he said.

‘No, Mairon,’ I cried, ‘have mercy! I swear I shall do anything you wish later. But now... I have waited so long. I need to touch you. Please. Afterwards... Once we have...’

‘So soon you retract your bold words? Afterwards, once your lust is sated, your efforts will be worth far less, a fraction of the struggle to curb five yéni of denial.’ His finger traced my upper lip as delicately as though I were made of glass. ‘Will you deprive me of the chance to savour the unique pleasure of watching you tame such wild desire to my will?’

His look of genuine disappointment spurred my pride.

‘Do your worst, tyrant!’ I growled, spreading my legs wide and raising my hands above my head to grip the thick carved spindles of the headboard. He laughed, and his eyes sparkled like those of a child who has been given a favourite toy.

‘Know the price of defiance! Every time a single finger of yours touches me, or your lips graze against my skin I shall make your release wait.’ His sidelong glance directed my eyes to the large hourglass on one of the bedside tables. ‘By a full turn.’

‘How about yours?’ I protested.

He just shrugged mischievously before kneeling up on the bed to take off his purple robe and the white silk shirt underneath. I held my breath at the sight of his chest and shoulders, smooth and muscled, perfection made flesh. His large uncut emerald winked at me, as though teasing me from its place of privilege, dangling just below the tempting hollow between his collarbones. Was my gift still precious to him, after all these years? I blinked away the threat of embarrassing tears.

He had not even touched me yet, but my hands already ached from the pressure of keeping them locked in place. All I wished was to caress every corner of his bare skin, and to delve beyond, under the dark cloth of his trousers.

When his fingers travelled sinuously from my wrist to my armpit, so lightly that they both tickled and titillated at once, I held my breath and curled my toes. His lips began to explore, burning their way downwards from my throat to my chest, on to my navel and lower, and I whimpered and arched my back like an eel twisting on the hook. My right hand shot out to cradle his head, but I remembered myself in time and jerked it back to grip a spindle. Mairon’s smile of triumph made me grit my teeth.

When his tongue found the moist tip of my cock, I screamed a curse. As he bit me, ever so gently, I begged him to stop, the first time of a thousand that night. But he was ruthless. When he took one of my stones in his mouth, sucking loudly, I couldn't bear it anymore. Releasing my grip on the headboard, I grabbed his hair in a hysterical attempt to pull him away.

He turned the hourglass and my torment continued.

Unhurried but relentless like the rising tide, he nudged me towards the dizzying edge, only to withdraw as I was left in midair, striving not to plunge into ecstasy, as he had commanded. I no longer heard my hoarse, incoherent pleas to be granted a respite, or felt my numb arms wrapped around the only anchor to sanity. After thousands of nights clinging to faint, lonely echoes of the past, I had forgotten how intense he could make my pleasure. Overwhelmed, my only thought was to resist the sweet onslaught of his hands and lips, to contain the fire he expertly stoked, now roaring and devouring my every nerve.

‘Turn over, my beauty,’ he said, much later.

Words meant nothing when I was sobbing from lust and love, my loins and my heart near bursting, banishing all rational thought.

Mairon’s soft laughter and the sudden lack of stimulation yanked me back into the world, where I lay, sweaty and aching with need. I was sluggish in my obedience because my body was tingling and thrumming, no longer under my command but his. After rising clumsily onto my elbows and knees, I gasped when his fingers found their final mark.

‘Well prepared, I see,’ he purred. ‘That foresight will spare you from the turn you still owe me.’

Without further preamble he was inside me, moving slowly to let me adjust to the initial discomfort. Then he thrust his hips forward, grazing the spot from where a universe of hot sparks seemed to explode.

‘You are free, Eönwë,’ breathed Mairon as he peppered tiny, wicked nibbles on my neck. With a couple of firm strokes to my long suffering arousal, he rushed me to find release, deafening as thunder. He followed almost at once and, for too brief a moment, he unlocked me from my prison of flesh and guided me to swim in the bliss of freedom at his side.

When we returned to our senses, we collapsed on the mattress. I snuggled close to him and let my head rest on his shoulder. For a while we lay in a silence that was only broken by the beating of his heart.

His voice, thrumming in his throat under my lips, startled me out of my reverie. ‘What are you thinking of?’

‘Of the intensity of our pleasure. Do you recall when we first came into Eä and discovered the thrill of merging? Our rewards were meagre in comparison to this.’

‘How can I ever forget? Eönwë of the House of Manwë, the noblest and most beloved servant of the Elder King was willing, nay, eager to coalesce his bright light into mine, that of a humble apprentice of Aulë, to savour forbidden delights!’

‘Humble? That will be the day the stars fall out of the sky.’ He grunted and I kissed his neck. ‘And they are not forbidden, merely improper except between espoused lovers.’

‘Which we were not,’ he said, smiling. ‘Propriety is a moot point, anyway. No incorporeal merging, not even when we made our streams collide within the heart of an imploding sun was ever more than a pale reflection of the exquisite quiver of the flesh we enjoy now.’

His fingertips caressed my forehead, then moved down my nose to my cheeks, chin and neck before repeating the same motions, warm and gentle as a feather. I smiled at the sound of his words:

‘Oh friend, how I missed you!’

Exhausted, his soothing touch lulled me inexorably towards sleep.

 

~ o ~

 

I woke up to meet his quicksilver gaze, which flickered with the reflections of the dying fire. The lamps were out. He seemed deep in thought, even melancholy.

I sighed happily and threw myself into his embrace, reaching out with my left hand to his face. He grasped my arm and I watched him trace the curve of the cuff wrapped in leather and begin to remove its disguise.

‘Is this...?’ When his voice choked at the gleam of mistarillë, I lifted my face. His eyes outshone the brilliance of his jewel.

‘After Námo remade it, I could no longer open it. Not that I ever wished it removed.’

‘You wear the token of your loyalty, and yet I...’ He averted his eyes, as though ashamed. ‘All these years, even when your steps followed mine tonight, I lived in fear of discovering that you had betrayed me, tempted by an offer of pardon in exchange for your assistance to plot my capture. After all, you had succeeded in your first mission, as I predicted and Námo confirmed.’ He smiled ruefully. ‘And as you can see, I could not resist swallowing your sweet bait, despite my misgivings.’

‘I was ambushed at their orders, yanked back to chastisement, and despised for defending your cause,’ I replied, unable to master a sharp pang of reproach from seeping into my voice. ‘I was forbidden from seeking you and the ban still stands, Mairon.’

He still held my hand, and raised it slowly to his lips. A burning trail of kisses ascending from my fingers to my shackled wrist and higher spoke his apology. Ticklish and aroused, I twisted my arm out of his grasp when he reached my elbow. His smile was made of playfulness and regret in equal parts.

‘This is not the first time I have defied their mandate,’ I added. ‘Long ago, when I failed to find you, I believed you were hiding from me.’

‘You searched for me?’ His keen eyes narrowed a little. Not out of sheer incredulity, I hoped, but scanning his mind for memories. ‘When? Where?’

‘Under every stone in Endórë,’ I chuckled. ‘Or so it seemed at the time, a handful of years after we were parted. I even crossed the desert and stood on the very border of Kiinlúum.’

I gave him a short summary of my travels, and when I concluded we retreated into a tense silence.

‘Annatar.’ I spoke with deliberate care the bold syllables of the epessë Nikteháa had given him, savouring the utterance of every sound. ‘You knew that this name would lead me to you as surely as a beacon. Why did you summon me, if you suspected I might have become your enemy?’

‘I wished to be proved wrong or... otherwise claim my revenge.’ My nape tingled with goosebumps, sensing the threat of bared steel under his measured words. But the dark flash in his pupils died within a heartbeat. ‘You alone understand why I could trust no one. That is, until now,’ he concluded huskily.

I considered his confession, reeling both at the ugly truth of how our encounter might have ended and at the grievous wound the Valar had inflicted on us, far deeper and more painful than our enforced separation. Yet I believed that our bond had survived their assault; despite all, Mairon was choosing to confide in me instead of spinning soothing falsehoods.

‘But why now, Mairon?’ I cried. ‘Why did you wait for over five yéni?’

‘Not out of choice, friend. I laboured to gather my power so that I could recreate my hröa and make it more powerful than it once was. Only then could I risk leaving my hiding place. I wandered for many years, until I heard of this young realm and realised I could make a new life here.’ He hesitated briefly. ‘Being a skulking fugitive in the wastelands of Endórë is lonely and conducive to useless regret, even despair. Amongst the Quendi I would at least console myself with the stimulation of like minds and the thrill of crafting beauty again, if you had indeed forsaken me. Now I am awed at what they are building and wish to help them achieve their dreams.’

‘Are you not afraid of being caught in a lie?’ I queried with a frown. ‘Aulë did not send you.’

‘I can hardly speak my true name amongst survivors of the War, can I? Tell me, friend, have you not lied also?’ At my surly silence, he inclined his head. ‘As to the Valar, I am neither afraid nor defenceless. My shield protects me from their interference and will warn me about their presence, even from afar. If they choose to attack, they may not find me as easy a target as last time.’

I would have asked him to explain his assertion but he spoke on. His voice dripped such cold hatred that I could not avoid shivering.

‘Did you hear what the righteous Lord of the West and his minions did to our beautiful realm, Eönwë, despite calling themselves guardians of Eä and of the Children of Eru?’

His mind pulled me in, so that I found myself replaying through his eyes the scenes that had marked the end of his life in Kiinlúum, while, entangled in my thought, he narrated the tale.

‘“Meldonya…” Your scream of ósanwë could only mean one thing: your hröa was releasing you from its bonds.

‘“They are here,” you said before your presence faded, and I knew my fears had turned real. I was too late to help you but I conjured a shield and made preparations, hoarding a few valuable jewels and dividing them. Half I hid in a leather pouch under my clothes, half I buried in our garden, near the place where, over the years, I had interred my cats. I saddled my fastest horse and paid some coin to one of our neighbours to keep it in his stable, at the ready. I left the house and wandered the city, listening to the growing, panicked rumours of treason. Chimal, it was said, had bought his life and his freedom from the invaders in exchange for the realm and for assistance to apprehend me, the demon spawned in the underworld.

‘Your master’s minions searched for me, as did the soldiers from Xamanlúum, but the shield prevented them all from finding me. Five days after your warning, your faithful servant Béek arrived, bearing your mutilated body wrapped in a ragged blanket. I stopped him just after he crossed the gates of the city. He babbled a story about vengeful gods whirling in glee over your fallen shape. Oh, Eönwë, I wept when I saw...’

With a shudder, I watched Mairon’s hands frantically pulling the torn cloth away to uncover my corpse, covered in blood and dirt, and inspecting the wound that had slain me. I was almost sick when I beheld my own face, distorted by death and the first signs of corruption of the flesh. I sobbed when Mairon’s fingers trailed gently over my filthy, matted hair. I heard his cry of grief, his roar of rage, the swish of a blade and the thud of Béek’s head hitting the ground. I gasped in horror and glared at Mairon.

‘Too late did I realise what I had done in my blind wrath,’ he continued and I stepped back into his memories. ‘Béek was only an innocent messenger, nay, more than that, a loyal servant who had fought the carrion birds and the hyenas to bring you back to me. But in my heart he had failed to protect you.

‘In the dead of night I built a pyre and burnt what was left of your hröa, with which you had given me so much pleasure. Before the leaping flames I swore vengeance against Manwë, his brethren and their thralls.

‘Rewards were promised to whomever brought me to the justice of the ahaw. I hastened to retrieve my horse, but I had walked into a trap. Fortunately, my betrayers were only Children, and it was easy to slay them all and flee, but I received a deep knife wound in my gut. By the following sunset, hordes bearing the colours from the northern fiefs advanced upon the city; the gates I had wrought were torn from the hinges; corpses hung from the ramparts; the smouldering ruins of our home stood beyond the crumbling garden walls.’

The ugly scenes of death and devastation brought tears to my eyes as Mairon pressed on.

‘I could no longer ignore Chimal’s treason, but I was growing weaker from containing the wound, which I could not heal while using my power to maintain the shield. In the end, I saw only one end.

‘I demanded to be taken before that traitor scum of a king, feigning I would surrender to him alone. Unwisely, Chimal decided he would toy with me before handing me to his allies, and ordered to have me stripped and flogged. Before his servants could lay a hand on me, I shifted my shape into that of a large black beast like Ungo, roared in his face and mauled him across the chest. Two of his spear-wielding guards had the courage to confront me. I killed one of them, but the other bought enough time for more soldiers to arrive. Enraged at my failure, I fled. That night I climbed over the wall, entered Chimal’s bed chamber and ripped his throat open. I ate his heart, too. My lion shape was hungry.

‘The city was sacked and razed to the ground, her people slain or enslaved across the whole realm. I had lost my hröa and knew our kin were still watching. The wisest course of action was to vanish, lick my wounds and regain my strength. I dug up my little hoard and swallowed the best stones, including your emerald.

‘By the time I crossed the desert, parched and starved, I no longer sensed my enemies but I was forced to discard my hold on the lion’s body. Shapeless and weakened, I struggled to provoke a small landslide that covered it along with my small fortune, thus protecting it from prying fingers until I could reclaim it.

‘I was free. Free but robbed of all we had built together, through the treachery of the righteous. Bereft and lonely.

‘Did I not tell you once that Light is treacherous, friend?’

The sequence of visions projected along Mairon’s narration dispersed like wisps of mist in the sun. With a lump in my throat from sadness mixed with disturbing unease, I threw my arms around his neck and clung to him, craving the safety of his comforting presence. I felt him stiffen at first, then he embraced me back. For a long while I enjoyed the feel of his warm, smooth skin against mine, the pressure of his solid muscles circling me tightly, the indescribable joy of having found him. No doubt he had been touched by the shadow triggered by his ordeal, but he had not reverted to the cruel Darkness his former master had once nurtured within him.

‘I have dreamt of this moment every day and every night,’ I whispered into his hair, giddy at the realisation of my happiness, only marred by the dull ache of the tragedy wrought on our behalf.

‘As have I, friend,’ he answered softly, pulling away a little, only enough to look into my eyes. My whole body tingled once more when he tilted his head slightly and his mouth quirked sideways into a familiar gesture that used to accompany his gentlest games. His strong hands raked my back, up and down the sides of my spine, making me purr with pleasure. ‘I believe you would welcome handing out retribution for my earlier torment? Or has my tragic tale cast you into too sombre a mood to enjoy the reminder of this night?’

There would be time to mourn but not then, when the answer to his invitation was already formulated most ardently between my legs. Very slowly he turned over, offering me the enticing sight of his rear, which he wiggled teasingly. I slapped him and admired the pink outline of my hand on his shapely rump, before worrying him along his cleft and homing in on my final target.

‘You will pay dearly for this harassment, Eönwë,’ he growled, burying his head against the pillow and clenching fistfuls of sheet to keep from swatting me aside.

‘In that case, I might as well commit the whole crime,’ I answered with a mock sigh of resignation, and whacked him squarely on the other cheek with my left hand, thus creating a most pleasantly symmetrical arrangement. He glared at me over his shoulder but, true to his word, allowed my well deserved payback, which we both enjoyed thoroughly.

Later I dozed, spooned against his chest, relishing the warm rhythm of his breath against my nape and his drawing of figures on my shoulder and arm with the caress of his fingertips.

The clarity preceding dawn arrived too soon; it was Mairon who reminded me of my duties to Elrond.

‘You had better attend to Eärendillion, friend,’ he said. ‘You are meeting the Lord and Lady of Eregion, no less.’ I ignored the faint mockery and hastened back into my clothes. ‘See if you can spare a word or two in my favour, for I would like to travel to Lindon one day and it is in Elrond’s power to advise his King to allow or deny my request. I fear he did not warm up to me last night.’ I frowned, recalling the conversation.

‘I noticed that too, Mairon, but I fail to understand what it was you said that provoked his unusual reticence.’

He shrugged. ‘Be discreet. From his ardent looks of longing in your direction, your lord will certainly ban my entrance in perpetuity if he knows where you have spent the night. Not that it will be too taxing for him to guess the nature of your nocturnal activities.’

Alarmed, I looked at the reflection of my flushed face and untidy hair in the mirror, and cursed silently at my failure to smooth with my hands the crumpled garments I was wearing.

‘Why do you wish to visit Lindon, anyway?’ I pushed my feet into the shoes and stood, ready to leave. With luck, I would have time to make myself more presentable. Mairon handed me my folded cloak.

‘Why ever not?’ he retorted smoothly. ‘Gil-galad may benefit from my services too.’

He opened a drawer and produced a key, which he handed to me before leading me back downstairs to a small side door.

‘Come at dusk.’ I nodded.

We kissed one last time, before I stepped out into the street. When I glimpsed back, a satisfied smile hovered on his lips.