The Region Cloud Hath Mask'd Him From Me Now by sallysavestheday

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The Region Cloud Hath Mask'd Him From Me Now

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Aman: Years of the Trees

Findekano woke, suddenly, to a noise he could not place. A strange alarm: a lost child calling out fearfully, perhaps, or some small animal, knowing itself trapped, whining in pain. But they had set no snares, preferring to fish and forage in their wandering, and so far from any settlement the chance of encountering other Elves was slim.

Findekano rolled and reached, whispering. “Russo?”

Maitimo’s empty bedroll lay cool under Telperion’s light where the tent flap gapped. Unwinding himself from his own blankets, Findekano followed the silvery beacon, seeking the source of that miserable sound.

The mists had risen as he slept, pearling the air. The moisture softened and fractured the Tree-light, folding their small camp into a pocket of quiet, smooth and luminous as the inside of a shell. Curled within that stillness, Maitimo huddled on the grass outside their tent, head bowed to his folded arms where they rested on his knees. He seemed to drift in and out of the fog, the bronze wash of his hair the only color in the numinous light. Unbound, the great sheaf of it fell about him in all its heavy glory. Findekano’s fingers itched, wishing to tangle in it, to test its softness against the skin of his hands.

He wiped his traitorous palms on his thighs, unthinking, and the soft sound drew his cousin back from whatever painful place within himself had caught him. The troubled oval of Maitimo’s face glimmered in the mist as he blinked up at Findekano, cheeks and frowning brow edged in Telperion’s silver, sharp nose and chin and elegant mouth all brushed with light.

Findekano’s heart lurched at the sight of that gilded beauty dimmed by pain. He crept to Maitimo’s side, knelt in silent comfort on the wet grass at his feet. In his company, Maitimo would sometimes shed his careful solemnity -- that deliberate calm he crafted, in contrast to his father, to curb his wells of power. With Findekano, those shields might slip, revealing a deep humor and tenderness, a bright, fierce pool of energy and potential for joy. Given care, and gentleness, he might lower his guard entirely, sharing his secret imaginings and his fears. Findekano had no words for how he treasured that trust, or what their friendship meant; it was better to let the steady certainty of his presence speak.

Maitimo’s mouth worked, shaping a wry smile as he straightened and sighed, reaching to clasp Findekano’s wrist.  

“I’m sorry to have troubled you, Fin. I’m only woolgathering. Foolishness. It will pass.”

The light suited him perfectly, Findekano thought: the diffused radiance isolating and containing his loveliness, setting him apart as he had ever been, distant and self-possessed and unattainable as a handful of fog.

So many times he had watched his cousin glide through the babble of court events and public spectacles like an ivory column, composed and courteous to all, but with closer regard for none. So fair, so absolute in his assurance. So oddly alone, among a people whose ties webbed and wove in such complex patterns, a folk of merry meetings and frequent, vigorous debate. Among their sparking, snapping kindred, Maitimo shone like a pale flame, unwavering.

Yet now he wept.

There was no doubt of it: the pale tracks on his face caught the light. That choked sound of pain that had roused Findekano trembled still behind his lips – no mark of injury, perhaps, but rather one of grief.   

Findekano brushed gentle fingers over his cousin’s cheek, questioning. Those pale lids dipped, copper lashes wet and heavy.

“I dream terrible things, sometimes…” And then Maitimo's fine grey eyes were searching his, brows knitting in trepidation or determination. “You do know, don’t you, how much you mean to me? I’d not have us parted, ever.” Maitimo drew a pained breath, grimacing. “It hurts, to dream you gone.”

And forestalling Findekano’s further questioning, he leaned and caught his mouth, swift and unexpected. But not unwelcome. Startled and delighted and instantly ablaze, Findekano surged up to meet him, kiss for kiss, touch for touch, until the heat of it banished all dreaming, all alarm.

Afterward, the silver light held them as they held each other: close, and soft, and warm.

 

Mithrim: After Thangorodrim 

“Again!”

Findekano danced neatly aside as Maitimo loomed out of the fog; he clouted his cousin across the back of his thighs with the flat of his blade. Maitimo cursed in some twisted tongue and spun to face him, panting.

Warm mornings after cold called the mists from the ground around the lake, and the pale tendrils wound about them as they struck and parried. Maitimo’s cropped hair flared out around his head, a bright beacon in the fog.

“Again, Russo. Faster. You were never so sluggish!”

The damp beaded on Maitimo’s eyelashes as he glared. He closed on Findekano in a rush, his left arm with its unaccustomed blade slashing.

Findekano met the blow and caught his cousin’s weight, grappling. The warmth of him was painfully familiar, even after being so long withheld. Maitimo would trust no one to touch him now, save the healers, and they only on sufferance. This daily clash, borne for its necessity, for the discipline it trained, was the only opportunity for the closeness that Findekano craved.

Cradling Maitimo on the eagle’s back, he had imagined tenderness – some sweet reunion after Ice and pain and separation. But the raw shadow of his cousin he had cut free from the mountain had healed into a whip of fury, and whatever dream of love’s rekindling Findekano cherished had been lost.

But now, as they swayed together, gasping in the fog, Maitimo radiated a dangerous heat. That warmth and the furious intensity of his gaze sparked Findekano swiftly to wanting. Maitimo saw it, as he saw everything with those great grey eyes, so long attuned to danger. He leaned in across their tangled hands, watched Findekano’s lips part in silent invitation and appeal. His own torn mouth twisted, then his teeth closed hard on Findekano’s ear before he hooked his ankle and swept him off his feet.

Stung and winded, Findekano could not summon breath to laugh – or weep, or pray – as Maitimo’s sword carved through the curling mists to settle at his throat.

“You’re dead,” his cousin ground out, wincing.

For a long moment, there was only the mist, and the point of his blade, held steady, and Findekano, panting up at him.

Something desperate moved in Maitimo's face, then he stilled it, tight and hard and fierce.

"Russo," Findekano ventured, but Maitimo turned and disappeared into the fog.

 

Himring: The Long Peace

The low clouds, settling, softened Himring’s edges, slowed the perpetual motion of the fortress, muted the ever-present clamor of alertness to a hum. The harsh light dimmed and faded, blanketing windows and courtyards and battlements in a softer, smoother white.

Industry trailed into forced but welcome leisure, as the castle’s denizens hunkered down and settled in.

Fingon sprawled on the low couch in Maedhros’ study, watching his cousin at his work. The left hand that had been so recalcitrant in Mithrim was long-healed and graceful as it moved across the page, conjuring diplomacy and settling accounts. Against the gauzy light of the fog beyond the window Maedhros’ profile showed dark and calm, touched with silver at his brow and jaw. He might have been young again, restored to composure and certainty, all the bright mass of his hair caught up in a complicated braid, delicately adorned.

Fingon regarded that intricate hairstyle with satisfaction. Coaxing Maedhros into elegance was always a delicate task, now, but the pleasure of the braiding and then the viewing repaid the effort splendidly. His hands still sang with the silkiness of that copper waterfall, that recovered softness of which he had so long despaired. Even now, his cousin permitted only limited touches; that he had managed such glory before Maedhros grew impatient was perhaps a function of the softening mists, the gentling of the fog.

Maedhros’ austere beauty caught at him, as ever: rose-gold hair and ivory skin and black, high-collared tunic, stark against the muffled light. There was no cure for it, Fingon thought. A thousand centuries would not rid him of his longing.

Some softness in the air pricked up his spine; his heart tripped at the indulgent almost-smile on Maedhros’ face as he worked through his correspondence, upright and graceful at his desk.

“There was fog like this when you first kissed me, Russ,” he heard himself saying, “Do you remember?”

The smooth movement of Maedhros’ hand did not falter, but his pale lips twitched. “And also when I nearly killed you, if I recall. Dangerous weather."

At Fingon’s huff of outrage, he laid down his pen and turned to face him, grey eyes wide and wary, neither hiding nor confiding anything. “Peace, Finno. Are we not reconciled?" And after a cautious breath: "I am more glad than I can say that you are here.”   

A sop, a rope; Fingon could not say, but the opening inflamed him. Maedhros bore his heated gaze with seeming equanimity, neither lowering his lids nor looking away, but Fingon read in his shoulders the effort it was costing him to cling to his dignity. He knew that pride, and once had known how to ease beneath it, to coax out tenderness when Maedhros held himself aloof. He gathered his own courage, and crossed to kneel at Maedhros’ side.

“But you did not kill me, Russo, and you shall not. That far and beyond I will always trust you. Will you not trust me?”  

Maedhros had drawn the stump of his arm tight against his waist, as if to hold himself in place. He was shivering, faintly, and in the pale light Fingon felt unmerciful, greedy, suddenly on the edge of despair. But it was not his nature to abandon hope. There was always one more chance, one more breathless prayer.

He leaned up, brushed his lips feather-soft against the corner of his cousin’s mouth. Felt him swallow and suppress a moan.

“It’s only me, Russ,” he murmured as he kissed along that ivory jaw and pressed his mouth tenderly to the pale curve of Maedhros’ cheek. “Remember? Once you loved my touch.”

Maedhros shuddered and drew a great breath. Fingon felt him gather himself, as for a plunge, then set the great engine of his will alight as his mouth opened under Fingon's, fierce and hungry. There was yearning to more than match his own in the long arms that rose to clasp him, in the hand that tangled in his hair.

“Always you, in the mists,” Maedhros gasped, clutching Fingon, eager and aflame. “Only you. Come here. Kiss me. Come here.”

 

Ossiriand: After the Tears

Maedhros waited for Fingon in the fog, hunched like some rocky outcrop in the forest, moss-gathering and rough-edged and grim.

Fingon would fuss, he knew, and tease him for slouching, with that pestering tenderness that bid fair, at times, to drive Maedhros nearly mad. He scowled, already preparing his defense, crouched over his pain and shivering.

He waited.

The small cloud eddies rose from the underbrush, teasing the edges of his tattered hauberk and tangling in the ruin of his hair. Maglor had offered to clean it for him, to brush it back and braid it, but the snap of Maedhros’ teeth and the ring of his sword leaving the scabbard sent him stumbling back and then scurrying away. The elaborate loops of hair that Fingon had braided and bound with gold before the battle hung tangled in Maedhros’ eyes, but he would not suffer anyone else to tend them.

He watched the mists, peering at every shadow that turned or spun, drawing phantoms from the fog with his heart’s yearning, then grimacing as the wind rose and they melted into air. Fingon laughing, Fingon dancing, Fingon curled into his side in silent comfort. Fingon leaning for a kiss, for an argument, stretched across him to wrestle with the iron cuff, then to cut and carry him away.

Why did he not come? It was damp and dreary, true, but Fingon had never been daunted by the gloom. Even the fumes of Thangorodrim had parted for him, he was so bright and brave and beautiful.

How had he managed it? The darkness of the Enemy’s lands was overwhelming. But Fingon had pierced it, somehow – he had glimmered, Maedhros remembered, in the fog.

And he had brought music. He would never forget the sweetness of that sound.

Perhaps Fingon was wandering, in these unfamiliar forests. If so, Maedhros knew how to find him in the haze.

Maedhros cleared his throat, a sound like stone on stone, worn dry with weeping. He tasted the mists to sweeten his tongue, and sang.