Chapter Text
Immortality was not sunshine and roses. It was not looking beautiful for centuries and calmly watching the goings on of the world with an indulgent smile. It was not remaining aloof. It was the slowly dawning realization that nothing lasted forever. From the blooms of the flowers, the smiles of your friends, to the stones of your home. It was watching mistakes being repeated over and over again. It was watching war and peace, life and death, the cycle of the seasons going on and on and on with no end in sight.
The flush of youth, where passion seemed so strong and bright, where hope still lived, Glorfindel missed it. He missed the unblemished pieces of his own soul, the occasional broken off key notes in his soul song. He missed feeling safe and contented. He missed when he did not have dreams of smoke, fire, and ash, of screams filling the air and a city falling. He missed when he was not so good at meteing out death. When his soul purpose in existence seemed to be to bring wrath and ruin to those who opposed him.
All his kindred began to wear away with time, even as their faces remained perfect and preserved in a semblance of youth. Glorfindel knew of many who had not been able to take it. This unending journey, the pain of horrors inflicted upon them, and the knowledge that some wounds to the soul would never truly heal. That there would be scars and phantom pains from pieces broken and lost inside them. Glorfindel had found many friends dead, taken by their own hands. Another wound to his soul, another scar to bare, and yet he kept walking.
The worst was always the Fading. To listen as notes began to quiet, the shine becoming muted, the shadows lengthening and wrapping around, the weight of grief becoming too much, crushing slowly everything within the one who had once been a friend or family. Slowly they would bleed out, days, months, years, until finally blessedly their pain would cease and their soul was gone and their heart finally stilled. It was when the absence of those beats was a kindness, that the pain had ended, and there would be time for peace and healing in Mandos’ halls.
Glorfindel had nearly Faded, once. He had felt the beginning pains, had felt the sickness begin. It had only stopped because, amusedly, he had reminded himself that he had not in fact Loved Ecthelion nor Egalmoth. Not in the way they had always Loved each other. Oh how he had hated at times sharing bunks with them. It had been all well and good that they were friends, dearest friends, but Glorfindel would not let them think that maybe Glorfindel had wanted more.
No, no.
So he had pulled himself up by the bootstraps, taking his sword and turning his back on Greenwood. Some of the happiest memories of his long life lived in those shadowed trees. Yet like Gondolin there was nothing except pain left. Nothing to help him keep his hold on his sanity. He had lost his oldest friends. He had lost the strange little hobbits who had wormed themselves into his heart like adorable burrs. Perhaps Elrond had something, or a great many somethings that he needed dead.
He never cared, not really, that the younger races thought him to be a bit off. Honestly he was. All of them, all his honored glorious kinsmen were a touch insane. Glorfindel was quite unashamedly proud of how easily he could make others shift uncomfortably, how he could make their hearts flutter in fear (or arousal), how they never could predict anything, save that he was going to be unpredictable. Most of the time they didn’t take him too seriously, for he attempted to make everything appear a game and amusing. He did not toy needlessly nor meddle too much in the affairs of kingdoms or the world.
Most of the time, when sat by Elrond’s side, they assumed it was a position of honor.
Not that Lord Elrond was keeping him within arm’s reach to prevent incidents. That the great kindly Lord of Rivendell more often than not was stomping on Glorfindel’s toes during dinners when outsiders were present, or once they’d turned a corner and no eyes save elven were watching, that the great lord would take Glorfindel by the ear and drag him to Glorfindel’s rooms.
Maintaining status quo was boring. Also not in Glorfindel’s admittedly contrary nature. No, he liked to ruffle feathers, he liked to cause a stir and have all eyes on him, yet not looking. Never actually looking. The younger races, the mortal races, never cared to peel off the masks they all wore. They never dared to truly dig into the flawed natures, the broken natures, of the elves. They never remembered, or wanted to, that elves were not perfect. Were not, never had been, and likely never will be. If they were then Glorfindel could say that there really wouldn’t be many elves in Arda.
Yet that meant little now. For there was a group, small and selected, that were learning that Glorfindel was not, in fact, a well of harmless sass. That beneath his smiles, lay sharp teeth, and sharper claws, and a dark unfurling rage that began to rumble and roar.
Glorfindel’s hand fisted in the hair of the transgressor, lifting the dwarf upwards, til they were eye level. His smile was dangerous now, standing in the middle of what appeared to be a Coup D’etat in regards to Erebor’s current monarchy.
“I would suggest you call this off. For I am very bored, Master Dwarf. So very very bored and you do not wish to become my distraction.”
His voice was a low silken purr. The dwarf kicked uselessly and the others had taken their attention off Thorin, and carelessly given it to him. One unfortunately stupid dwarf took a threatening step forward, hands clenching on a war axe. It was the last conscious decision the dwarf made. In a movement that was as beautifully fluid as it was deadly, a knife seemed to magically appear in that dwarf’s throat. He fell to the ground, dead in seconds, in a puddle of his own blood.
“Last chance. Call this off and seek mercy from the King.” It was a final, light warning, delivered in a tone that had the hairs on all the dwarves bodies standing up because of the mildness that lay within.
“Never you damnable tree shagger. Bar-“
As far as last words went, Glorfindel mused, those were not nearly as inventive as it could have been. It was quick, the death of the dwarf in his hold. Glorfindel didn’t even care about the blood that covered him. He had been covered in it so many times it hardly registered anymore. Glancing at Thorin who looked enraged and barely concealed by Dwalin who held an axe out ready to kill any dwarf who came near, Glorfindel felt a little thread of relief that Thorin seemed unharmed.
Then he took his eyes off the one he had sworn to protect and let them fall to the ones he was going to kill.
The fight was quick as it was gruesome, and sadly outmatched. It was over too quick, Glorfindel finding himself, once again, in the center of dead bodies. They were dead, he had killed them, and it was as it always seemed to be.
“How did you know?”
Dwalin had asked him, hours later, after they finished rooting out traitors and executing them. Glorfindel had washed the blood from his body by then, changed into new clothes, and was working on his newest favorite pastime. Glancing up from his knitting needles Glorfindel felt his lips curve into a wry smile.
“Elves are taught to look for the signs for imminent kinslaying and how to prevent it so clusterfucks don’t happen.”
There was no recognition to the uncouth joke and Glorfindel mentally sighed. Shaking his head slightly he stared into the dwarf’s serious eyes.
“I have lived many years, Master Dwalin. I have seen many betrayals, I have seen much death, and I know when someone has a killing intent.”
“As good as ye are at fighting, lad, yer a shitty knitter.”
Thank you for saving my King.
Glorfindel barked out a laugh, reading Dwalin’s intent…or perhaps the dwarf’s mind. It was hard to tell some days. It didn’t matter though, which it was. Something in that phrase eased the dark prowling beast inside him.
“I am, aren’t I?”
The attempt at the scarf was horrendous. There were dropped stitches in some rows, extra ones on others. It was going to be a lumpy hideous creation.
“Tell ye what. Finish that thing and I’ll make sure it has a home.”
I’m going to take that scarf and wear it even if I have to steal the stupid thing from you, elf.
Glorfindel didn’t want to acknowledge he dropped another stitch when Dwalin said…thought…implied that. That he had lost, for a moment, the steady haze that surrounded him. That surprise, undisguised, unfeigned, crossed his features as the grizzled dwarven warrior grinned at him like a cat who had finally caught a particularly clever and vexing mouse. Nor did he acknowledge that heat, strange and almost foreign, stirred in his heart and soul as Dwalin kept staring.
Dwalin’s soul was so strange. Grizzled and scarred, like the dwarf’s body, yet there was something else in there too. Amongst the holes and the oddness that all dwarven souls had. It made Glorfindel want to explore. For Dwalin seemed unique in more ways than just being his usually favorite dwarf in Erebor. Nori was Dwalin’s only contender, but Nori was never captured quite as easily as Dwalin seemed to be.
Yet Glorfindel felt maybe he had been the one to walk into a trap.
Dwalin left soon after, without a goodbye or much explanation at all. Glorfindel watched him leave, his eyebrows furrowing together as he felt… more than he had in centuries. Emotions he could not quite name nor recognize.
Immortality was not fun. It did not grant many, if any, answers to life’s questions. It was hard, it was draining, it wore down on you until there was little left. Yet Glorfindel could not find it in him to regret his long life right now. Not at this point, with strange curious feelings fluttering about inside him. There would be regret one day, and perhaps he’d join his fellows across the Sea or die in battle. Perhaps some other dark gruesome fate awaited him. Until that fate came though, he would finish this scarf and perhaps, maybe, coax a smile from Dwalin’s lips.