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“Let us not argue,” was the first thing Finrod tells Curufin when he opens the door to see him. Even then he knew it to be a futile gesture, but it is worth the attempt if nothing else. “Please, Curvo,” he said then, and Curufin had kissed him hard and he took it to be acquiescence, of the only sort that Curufin has grudgingly given him.
Years and years ago on a fairer shore, in a simpler time, those kisses would be affectionate, nothing but a way to save pride that was barely bruised. Now, they hurt, and the iron tang of blood floods them- Curvo’s tongue is sharp, but so are Finrod’s teeth.
“Let us not speak at all,” Curufin had countered, his mouth red and well-kissed, becoming even with the flatness to it and the dangerous flame in his eyes. How like his father he is, Finrod sometimes thinks bitterly, but then that is not true at all. There is something brittle in Curufin today, he moves with purposeless energy pouring out of him; Finrod felt it when they kissed again then and he feels it now with Curufin utterly still against him, the slow tick of ratcheting tension towards a spark, an explosion.
How well Finrod knows him still; how much a stranger he seems.
Their bodies still fit together. They remembered how to move together tonight- this night, and all the nights before, though there were no tender touches to be found between them. Finrod often wishes that there were, but tonight, with an ache settling into his thighs, his fingers sticky from Curvo’s wetness, the marks on his neck throbbing in time with the bruises that are sure to bloom on his hips- he does not.
The ache is good, the ache means that he will remember this for a time yet. When he is far away, he will have proof that it happened. Proof of contempt, and desperation, if not love, but even that is a badge he will wear with honor, for he has left his own marks: Scratches at the slats of his ribs where Finrod’s fingers so easily fit; a bite to the neck, to the swell of his chest, to the insides of Curufin’s thighs. Finrod tastes him still, but that will be the first to disappear.
He licks his lips.
It is Curufin who speaks first, into the silence brokered by the cooling of desire. Finrod could laugh; Curvo never could abide the quiet, even if it meant breaking rules he himself had set. His propensity for hypocrisy is at times astounding, and Finrod had once found it endearing. An echo of that warms his chest, much diminished.
“I suppose that is the last opportunity we’ll have for such things,” he says, turning onto his back. His hair spills like ink across the pillows, his arm is still flung across Finrod’s chest.
“We made it count,” Finrod offers. “And it will be my last chance to indulge in a great deal of creature comforts for some time.”
Curufin’s mouth flattens into a line; Finrod knows its displeasure.
“Creature comforts,” he echoes. “As if you will only be in want of a hot bath on this fool errand.”
“I will want for clean clothes too, I should think. And your company,” Finrod adds, his tongue loosened by pleasure. Curufin tenses; a barb has landed though Finrod did not intend it.
“You know that this is not some camping trip,” Curufin presses. “Not like your little excursions to visit the Edain you have befriended, nor to explore the woods or seek a cave for your secret city. You treat this as a mere expedition in Valinor, but perhaps I should have expected you to take it less than seriously.”
“I am a king in my own right, I survived the Ice, the Bragollach, and my realm is intact,” Finrod says, sharper than he means to. “The realm that was founded on orders from the Lord of Waters himself, I might add.”
“You think you are blessed by the Valar, and that makes you immune to dying? Your arrogance is incomparable.” How many times has Curufin said that, fond, angry, bitter? Finrod has never thought to count. “They have no power here, they relinquished it a long time ago and allowed this entire world to fall under Morgoth’s shadow. And even if they had not, they have abandoned us as thoroughly as we abandoned them. Such generosity, from your Lord of Waters.”
“Generosity indeed, to tell me that I might need a city such as this, a place where you and yours came after the Bragollach. And prudence, so that the Noldor might thrive still in some places. It is not all courage in battle that makes a king,” Finrod retorts. “But leadership and wisdom, and am I not named among the Wise?”
“Yes, from a race who is so short-lived that they have not the time to accrue true wisdom from experience.”
“Do you deny my courage, then? What I have built here, and the friendships I have built elsewhere to bring the Noldor allies? Not just with the Edain, but in Doriath as well, making excuses for you and your brothers before the king whose kin you slayed across the Sea,” Finrod is pushing, and perhaps he should not, but here at the end he wishes to know how deep Curufin’s contempt of him runs. And how deeply Finrod wishes to be cut by it.
“Come, now, Findaráto. All those stories you would tally as courage are just vanity, and all your deeds you would tally as righteousness only serve to make you a liar.” Curvo’s words cut, as they always do. He is furious- but then he is always furious these days, thunderous and dark, Finrod rarely finds it within himself to match this, but it stirs now, a slow, ponderous thing. His heart thunders in his chest.
Vanity- no, there will be no vanity, on this quest. And between he and Curufin, there is none.
“We are at the end of vanity,” Finrod says, the words heavy on his tongue just as Curufin’s hand is heavy on his chest.
“Are we? The only thing we are at the end of is your reign,” Curufin replies. There is little venom in his voice; that is surprising. “O King of Nargothrond.”
Finrod closes his eyes and waits for the rage to come. It is just out of reach, this endless surging tide- he was there, he heard Curufin’s speech, and then Celegorm’s after, the visions of death and barely-veiled threat. A Silmaril, still in the hands of Morgoth and befouled. A Silmaril, which tempted the Dark Lord himself to slay Finwë and bring darkness to Valinor; a Silmaril, which he and his brothers are oathbound to hunt unto the ends of the world, and should they be in the hands of an elf, those hands are easier to pry loose than that of a Vala. A Silmaril, and in its light Nargothrond’s ruin.
His people turned against him in an instant.
No, it is more than that. Longer, perhaps, a thing that has been building and that he has been blind to. Finrod had thought he knew what it was to be a king: He has a city, he has his people who he led to its safety, as Finwë did. He knows the nebulous authority of another, as Finwë did. What more is there but that base exchange- responsibility for lands to call his own, a title rightfully deserved. What use is being a prince, or a lord, when one might be a king?
But then what use is being a king, when there are oaths to contend with?
Maedhros, he supposes, knew that before any of them.
He does not say this to Curufin for all that it would cut him too.
“I must keep my word,” Finrod replies. “You should know that much.”
“Must you?” Curufin laughs, brittle. His hand presses down hard as he pushes himself up. He is not tall, just as Fëanáro was not tall, but his eyes burn and he looms over Finrod easily like this.
A quickening, below his stomach.
“You swore no oath that cannot be broken,” Curufin continues. “You did not need to go yourself. You could provide men, aid, and call that a debt paid- you could throw this Beren out easily, and call that a debt paid, for it would save his life were he to be dissuaded thus from this course.”
“Trickery,” Finrod tells him. Curufin’s hand presses down harder; his ribs groan quietly in complaint. “Evasion. He is a good man, as his father was a good man. Bëor was my friend, I owed Barahir my life, and now his son comes to collect this debt. He would do it alone if I turned him away; at least he might see a chance of success in this way.”
“Lúthien of Doriath must be fair indeed, for him to risk that much. And her father must value her dearly, to set so high a price on her hand.” Curufin smiles, unpleasant. “Or perhaps he hoped that Beren would come to Nargothrond, and Tyelko and I would save him the trouble of getting his hands dirty. Elu Thingol must share your disdain for hard work.”
“It is a petty piece of dissuasion,” Finrod returns, ignoring this insult. “And she is very fair. She is half-Maia, how could she not be? Melian’s daughter, with power we could not imagine running through her veins. That is not why he would pay this price; he loves her.”
“I forget that you are a romantic.”
“You forget that you were once one, too.” Finrod closes his eyes for a moment, reaches for those rose-tinted memories. They slip through his fingers like grains of sand. “And I know that you would not kill him. It would be a profane breach in hospitality.”
“Do such laws apply to the aftercomers?” Curufin asks, one eyebrow raised.
“Do not,” Finrod warns him. “And even if the laws did not: I am still king here for this night, and my laws forbid it.”
“You will not die a king,” Curufin says, flat. “Do not tell me you mean to meet Morgoth in single combat as did our uncle. You were never so competent a warrior.”
“Song, perhaps,” Finrod replies lightly. “I am no Makalaurë, but I may do enough to distract him while another seizes his crown.”
“Is that the extent of your plan?” Incredulous, and Finrod does not let this give him hope. “To distract Morgoth? And what of reaching Angband itself, what of the escape after? This Beren has no true plan, that much is clear, but to think that you would exceed him in foolishness.”
“We may succeed,” Finrod reminds him. They must succeed, though the chances are slim. It is a worthy quest, Finrod made a promise, and what other choice is there but to fulfil it? There will be glory, and light, and great joy if they should succeed- they may not strike Morgoth down, but it will be a grievous blow dealt.
“With not a single one of you capable of thinking ahead? I doubt it.” It is so very close to the fond banter and bickering they would find themselves in, Finrod playing the fool to make Curvo bristle in the golden light.
“Come with me, then. Plan it with me, put that clever mind of yours to use.” A foolish offer, one that will be declined. He knows not why he said it at all. Finrod does not regret making it; he does regret the sudden rush of hope, the flicker of an image- he and Curufin united by a common enemy, grown as close as they once were. A quest for the Silmaril, yes, but Elu Thingol need only see it. A bride price not for fair Lúthien, but for Curufinwë Atarinkë, the only thing that Finrod might offer to obtain his hand a second time.
“Come with me,” he repeats, “and fulfil your own oath. The Silmarils, in the hands of their rightful owners. We do not have time to send to the rest of your brothers, but you and Celegorm might come, might make a difference.”
“You would denounce our oath and our actions, yet use us for your own ends in the same breath. I had forgot what sort of base cunning you might employ when it suits you, Findaráto.” It is not a compliment, but there is a touch of the old admiration there. Curufin likes clever things, he has always liked when Finrod was clever. “But it is a fool’s errand. I would not attempt it with all my brothers; I will not attempt it with only you, a man, and those ten brave or stupid enough to follow you in this.”
“Curvo, please,” he says, and he cannot count how many times he’s pleaded this way over the years, but never have the words broken so in his mouth.
“No,” Curufin says, final. “You go and seek preservation of your vanity, chase that image of your honor straight into your grave. I will remain and preserve your kingdom, tend to it as I would my son. As I will my son.”
The possessive hurts. For it is their son here, and Tyelpe walks through the halls as a wraith some days, treats him as a lord, or an uncle, but not a father. Finrod knows he only follows Curufin’s example; there is something yearning in his eyes when he looks at him, and there is always an unbearable sense of loss that Finrod grapples with whenever he looks back.
“He is my son too,” Finrod tells him softly. It is all he can say.
“In matter, and perhaps he has some of your spirit too, though it is not for the better,” Curufin allows, cruel. “He is- the greatest thing I could have ever dreamed of crafting, the best work of this body and more. He is better than us both, as children should be, but do not forget that it was I who raised him, who taught him, who brought him to the forge and encouraged his interests in language and art. Tell me, Finrod Felagund, what you have taught Curufinwë Tyelperinquar, what you have given him but a name from your mother’s people, and then you might claim him as your son too.”
Curufin’s hand has curled into a fist against Finrod’s skin; the other rests on his belly, where there are faint stretch marks present. Finrod does not think Curufin knows he is doing this.
The rage is here now, hollow fury rushing to his ears. Curufin has denied him many things, has thwarted him at many a turn and before this Finrod would have called it one of many games between them, but this is cruel beyond measure. His son, who he had little part in raising, because Curufin had whisked him away to Formenos when Tyelperinquar was so young, because Beleriand is chaos incarnate and more dangerous than they had imagined, because Nargothrond was meant to be a safe place for him, but by the time Tyelpe had come with his father, he did not need one so sorely and he was as a stranger.
“I would have given him far more than that, had you let me,” he says, slow and deliberate. He will not shout, he will not give Curufin the satisfaction of having so gotten under his skin. “He is my son, I would have given him everything that a father so bound to the Silmarils could not.”
Curufin goes very, very still. Finrod sets up and meets his burning gaze unflinchingly.
“You of all people do not get to tell me that I cannot call him my son.”
“And what use would that be, when you go to your death in the morning?” Curufin spits back, white-faced. He stands, his legs trembling slightly, and Finrod does not move to help him. He merely watches him dress, cold with anger, the iron taste of fear burning the back of his throat. “You have always been lucky, Findaráto, but that is not enough. Go, then. Kingdomless, husbandless, utterly dispossessed by your own choices.”
Finrod merely watches him leave, slamming the door so hard it echoes in his ears.
His hands are shaking, he turns them to fists to stop it.
He does not sleep that night, and when he leaves in the cold grey dawn with his loyal Ten and Beren beside him, he aches all over.
The end of vanity, he reminds himself, but he cannot hear it without Curufin’s mockery overlaying the words.
The end of a king.