Chapter Text
“You will rot to the core,” Elrond told Thranduil, and his eyes looked as though he had done this many times before, talked men down from their lofty, self-destructive dreams; perhaps he had.
Thranduil looked away, hiding behind his long blond hair. “I’m fine,” he said again, and pinched a fold of cloth from his coat between his fingers.
Elrond frowned, eyebrows swooping over his eyes and nostrils flaring, and then sighed, face relaxing. “Your son isn’t going to want to know you, if you don’t stop this,” and he gestured around at the mess of the room – dirty clothes piled on the floor, empty bottles rolled into corners and half-hidden under the unmade bed. The heating was off despite the winter chill, and there was frost on the inside of the windows. “I know you’re grieving. We’ve given you as much of a leave of absence as we can afford, I’m afraid. It’s either teach again, or you’ll be let go,” and his face was impassive as he said this.
“You bastard,” Thranduil muttered, and forced a hand through his dirty hair, tossing his head back. “Fine. I need the money, and aurum potestas est.” he said. “But I’m not taking on any new students this year. My classes work best with me when they’re small and contained. I don’t like – “
“Yes,” Elrond said, “I am aware of your need for isolation. It’s not fair on the students you could teach, though,” and he paused.
“I teach the students who are the best,” Thranduil tried to argue, but he sniffed. “I suppose I could relax the entrance criteria, just a little. And I’m doing this for Legolas, not for you, although to you I am semper fidelis,” he added warningly. “He’s eighteen. He can make his own choice about where he lives – but I’d rather see him than he move in with that Gimli friend of his. You know,” he went on, “that short boy who rides the motorbike. I think his father is a craftsman of some sort – I met him once, years ago.” He smiled ruefully. “He didn’t like me very much.” He paused again. “But then he has Aragorn, as well. I wish I could see what went on in that boy’s head! Aragorn or Gimli, but I can’t even decide which one I disapprove of the most. He sleeps around more than I did at his age,” and he smiled again.
Elrond frowned. “Well, if only for the sake of Legolas – and, I was very friendly with – “
Thranduil whirled round, coat-tails flying. “Don’t say her name,” he said quietly, but his voice was undercut with menace and he looked towards Elrond as if his gaze could slice flesh. “I can’t say it, yet. Legolas won’t say it, won’t think about it – all he says is how I betrayed her anyway.”
Elrond looked up. “Betrayed her?”
Thranduil sighed again, forcing his hands deep into his pockets. “It was a one-night thing. She’d been dead for three weeks and I was very drunk,” and Elrond winced at that.
“Go on,” he said, and bent down to pick up the bottles that crowded at his feet.
“I was at a bar – that one in town that’s run by Gimli’s father’s friends, all those ex-soldiers he knows. I’m still not sure of his name, but he had a long beard. I’ve never been able to grow a beard,” he mused, and Elrond heard the words start to blend into each other.
“You’ve been drinking already this morning, haven’t you?” he asked quietly, but Thranduil ignored him.
“He fucked me, and Legolas caught us. He was pretty angry about the whole thing,” he said bluntly, and then shrugged. “I knew for a long time that I wasn’t quite straight. I mean, the hair should have been a giveaway. But when I watched my father die, I decided that I could never let him down. I had to have a child, because I had to give a child the chance to watch me die.” and his words trailed away into silence. He smiled.
Elrond looked at him, wearing his coat like chainmail and using his words like weapons. “Thranduil, you need to stop this. I mean it,” he added, as Thranduil raised a finger in protest. “This – this death-wish you have is ridiculous. If you can’t live for the memory of the woman you loved, live for your son. You lost your father, I know that. But your son doesn’t need to lose you.”
Thranduil looked up at that. “I’m all he’s got, aren’t I?” He laughed, and it was a broken sound. “He’s as fucked as I am.”
“Stop that,” Elrond said sharply. “Get into the shower. Wash your hair, and I’ll make you some coffee. And then we’re going to tidy up,” and Thranduil mumbled something but loped over to the bathroom, pulling his shirt over his head as he went.
Elrond tried not to curse under his breath when he saw how thin Thranduil was, how his bones stretched the skin and his hipbones were hollowed around the swooping cavern of his stomach. He marched into the kitchen, and pulled open the fridge – it was turned off, with half an apple and a bottle of milk both moulding, and swore again.
He grabbed a plastic bag from the floor and started shoving bottles and boxes into it, recoiling from the sweet smell of rot. Takeaway menus were crammed through the letterbox, although (given the state of Thranduil’s ribs) he knew they hadn’t been used. When he moved them, a horde of spiders scurried for the safety of the skirting boards. Bills were piled up on the doormat, and when he tried to flick the light on it only sparked for a second. The power was off.
Thranduil came back from the bathroom, wearing only a pair of boxers. “The shower’s not working,” he said petulantly, and Elrond rolled his eyes.
“Right,” he said firmly. “Get dressed again – there must be something clean in this house, even if it’s Legolas’s – I’m sure he does his washing. You used to be just as scrupulous about this sort of thing as he did,” and Thranduil rolled his eyes but turned to find something to wear, walking along the walls as if it would steady him better.
“Where are we going?” he called, through the half-open door of his bedroom.
“You’re going to have to come and stay with me for a bit,” Elrond replied, already sifting through the bedrooms at his house for a suitable one. “There’d be room for Legolas as well, if he wanted,” and Thranduil poked his head round the door, face sombre.
“Thank you,” he said simply, and Elrond nodded at him. He disappeared again, and in a few minutes was by the front door in a plain white shirt, and incredibly tight black jeans.
“Are they Legolas’s?” Elrond asked, amused.
“No,” Thranduil said proudly, and for a second, Elrond was reminded of him when he was the lord and master and monarch of his department, when students followed his teaching like gospel.
“You’re a good teacher,” he told him.
“Going to let me prove it?” Thranduil asked, with a hint of his old arrogance and charm.
Elrond laughed at that. “Wait until we get to Rivendell first, and then we can sort something out. Next term starts in a week – will you be ready by then?”
Thranduil sighed, and worried his hands in his pockets, but then stood straighter again. “Are the scars – “
Elrond half-smiled, sadly, at that. “I didn’t even notice them. Although I did wonder why you, of all people, had not a single mirror,” and Thranduil laughed at that.
“Besides,” Elrond added, “that ex-soldier of yours didn’t seem to mind. We all have scars, Thranduil. Yours are just written on your face as well as your soul.”
“Yeah, that ex-soldier didn’t mind because he had his own scars. Memento mori; we’re both fucked up in the head,” and he laughed again, slightly wildly. “He’s not mine. I’m not even mine any more – I’m ruled by the bottle and the occasional ministrations of my doomed colleague in the Latin department. And you, I suppose. I bow,” and he did, an exaggerated, embarrassing farce, “to the gods of education and the national curriculum.”
All Elrond said was “Get in the car, Thranduil,” and he did.