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Carnistir charged up the stairs and knocked on Maitimo’s door. It must've been latched, because it didn't swing open at the force of his knock. He huffed. "Nelyo! You missed dinner and Atar is putting the food away!"
"I'll be down in a minute!" Maitimo called through the door. His voice sounded strange.
"Atar, Nelyo's coming!" Carnistir yelled down the stairs. "Don't put the food away!"
"Alright," Atar called up from the dining room. "Nelyafinwë, clear up once you're finished!"
The latch rattled on Maitimo's door and he stuck his head out. "Yes, Atar!"
"Come on, Nelyo," Carnistir said. "I helped Atar slice tomatoes and I stirred the pot. You need to try it."
"Good job, Carnistir," Maitimo said. His voice rasped a little and he coughed.
Carnistir looked up at Maitimo's face. It was red and blotchy. "Were you crying? Your face is red."
It was a bit odd to think of Maitimo crying, but Carnistir supposed that sometimes things must have wrong noises or textures for Maitimo, too.
"Maitimo," Carnistir said, after a moment where Maitimo rubbed at his nose and ran a finger under his eyes, "you can use my loom. If you want," he added, in case Maitimo didn't want to. He usually wanted to weave when he was shaky and upset like Maitimo looked, but maybe Maitimo didn't want to. Sometimes when Carnistir was upset the thought of the loom made him shake and want to scream.
Maitimo blinked red-rimmed eyes at Carnistir, looked over the banister toward the dining room, and then back at Carnistir. "You've already eaten?" he checked.
"Yes," Carnistir said, pivoting to go to his weaving-room instead of down the stairs. When they got there, though, all Maitimo did was sit down in the big chair he usually sat in when he watched Carnistir weave.
"You go ahead," he said before Carnistir could question it. "I'll watch."
Carnistir shrugged and got to work. He was still too small for a full-sized loom, but he was still able to make little blankets and floor mats and even once a pillow-cover on his smaller loom. Right now he was trying to figure out how to make pictures like Haruni had.
Maitimo always made sure to be very quiet while Carnistir worked, so that he didn't get frustrated from too many things to think about, but tonight he was extra quiet, almost like he was asleep. Carnistir checked, once, but all Maitimo did was cock his head at him.
After a while Carnistir's fingers got bored of the threads and he clambered off his stool. Maitimo opened his arms just like he always did and Carnistir curled up in his lap like he was a baby. It was alright though: Carnistir didn't mind when Maitimo hugged him tight.
Carnistir looked up at Maitimo’s face, once: his eyes were still red, but they weren’t nearly as shiny.
~
The gleaming point of Carnistir’s needle winked up from the cloth in his hands, a woefully inadequate wool that was yet the best he had to offer. Warm, and soft, and perhaps, pretty, a deep red, but not anywhere near the quality of clothing that a convalescent required. This cloak would be for later, when Maitimo’s skin was not yet paper-thin and prone to tearing, and the weight of the fabric could be borne without the bowing of his neck or any stumbling.
That day would come, and when it did Maitimo would at least have a sufficient cloak to wear until a better one could be made.
It was dark, and the banked brazier gave barely enough light to stitch by, but anything brighter would wake Maitimo, and he already spent his nights in either a drugged stupor or restless twitching. It was the twitching, tonight, and judging from the time since Maitimo had last woken and the sudden halt to the shifting of the bedsheets, he had just awoken.
Maitimo spent more time lucid than not, these days, but Carnistir still hummed a little tune as he stood, carefully hiding the needle so that Maitimo would not panic at the flash of metal. Music helped, they had discovered in the early days, and in the dark of night it was still sometimes needed.
Maitimo hummed back at Carnistir, two broken notes that nevertheless told him that his brother knew where he was, or at least that he was among friends.
There was ever a kettle at the brazier, and Carnistir stirred the coals from their slumber with a word and put the water to boil. There was more rustling from the bed; Maitimo had turned to watch. His right eye flashed strangely in the darkness and the left was completely dimmed of the light of the Trees. He put Carnistir in mind of an injured wildcat, at times. The water boiled, Carnistir added the aþëa, and as the scent of Valinórë in days past began to waft through the air, Maitimo watched the kettle carefully.
He had learned that good things come from it, Carnistir thought, and then rebuked himself for thinking of his elder brother as he would some particularly intelligent animal. Maitimo had hummed: he was lucid enough.
The tea steeped and cooled enough so Maitimo would not hurt himself if his hand shook—it seemed it was impossible to over-steep aþëa—and Carnistir brought a cup over to the table beside Maitimo’s bed. Maitimo was not yet strong enough to sit up in bed by himself, so Carnistir slowly signed the question—I help you sit?—and watched for Maitimo’s nod. An awkward bob of the head and Carnistir peeled away the blanket and furs to Maitimo’s waist. A pillow in one hand, sitting on Maitimo’s right to prevent movement of the shoulder, a quick heave, and Maitimo was upright. Carnistir retrieved the cup of aþëa and helped fit it into Maitimo’s trembling left hand. Their arms went up, and Maitimo guzzled the lukewarm tea like it was Yavanna’s finest miruvórë. Carnistir pulled it away from his lips, sometimes, so he could swallow and not choke, and finally when they were three-quarters of the way through the cup Maitimo turned his face away.
The cup and kettle were set aside to be washed, Maitimo ever watching, and Carnistir wished he could narrate his actions for Maitimo like the healers sometimes did. Words escaped him tonight, though, so they remained in silence.
The half-finished cloak was still on the stool beside the brazier; Carnistir spared a glance for it as he banked the coals again before signing to Maitimo I help you lay-down?
Maitimo blinked, once, twice, the scab over the laceration that dragged at the corner of his left eye crinkling and cracking at the motion.
Carnistir signed again. No lay-down?
Maitimo glanced at his lap, and Carnistir could see him carefully curling his fingers. They had needed to be re-broken to heal correctly, and Findekáno thought that even now too much movement was difficult, if not painful.
Come-here, Maitimo signed awkwardly.
Carnistir quickly repeated the sign, properly with both hands, and Maitimo nodded slowly. His blinks were growing longer. Lay-down together? Carnistir guessed. Another nod.
More shuffling, and some rearranging of blankets, and Maitimo was on his back again, tucked under furs and blanket, and Carnistir laid beside him. The bed was bigger than perhaps a convalescent needed, made for a king, and there was plenty of space for Carnistir and another blanket to lay on top of the furs.
Maitimo hummed the same two cracked notes in the dark, and Carnistir hummed them back.
~
The scrape of metal against whetstone was an awful, thoroughly bad one, but Caranthir clenched his jaw, closed his ears against it as tightly as he could, and bore it. They were going to battle, and the sounds of preparation were to be expected.
The hosts of the sons of Fëanor together no longer numbered in the thousands, as they had at their height. Before the battle. But there were still hundreds that would come when their lords called.
He’d heard Emlin’s report just last night; morale was moderate to good. Everyone had lost someone in the battle, and most were eager to take revenge on those who had not only stolen from their lords but sat behind their fence while the Ñoldor were decimated.
More fool them, but Caranthir did not say such things anymore.
Emlin hadn’t needed to tell him that most of the forces believed they were camped outside the borders of Doriath as an intimidation tactic.
Even Emlin, who had once been Himring’s lieutenant of intelligence and now answered directly to Caranthir, hadn’t spent much time in Amon Ereb, those years before this. Even that little time near his brothers had been enough for her to understand the scope of this move—the true intent behind their actions.
Caranthir knew that said something about her, her morals or her loyalty or the depth of her rage, but the sound of the sword being sharpened kept him from pursuing the thought.
It was far enough past midnight to begin preparing the advance guard, he thought, standing up from the wicker chair he had brought from Amon Ereb. Celegorm had mocked him, had asked if he intended to receive Dior in his tent, holding out his hand for the Silmaril from his chair.
Caranthir rested a hand on the carefully woven back of the chair, pressing his fingertips against the smooth slats. It was easy enough to ignore Celegorm these days. Indeed, Caranthir was almost continually impressed by his own altruism, since… since.
The advance guard could wait, he decided. It really was only him, his closest men, Celegorm, Curufin, and those mad enough to follow Celegorm after Nargothrond.
Instead of waking his two maddest brothers, Caranthir walked down the line of tents toward the head of the main forces, where Maglor and Maedhros were camped.
Grass crunched beneath his boots. There were no birds singing, but the sounds of an army slowly beginning to wake in the hours before dawn permeated the air.
Caranthir wanted to press Maedhros’ bony hand between both of his and assure him one last time that everything would be alright, in the end. Look into his shattered gaze and, like Emlin, promise his vengeance. Ever had Maitimo carried them on his shoulders—perhaps now Carnistir could finally ease the burden.