Chapter Text
The crisp crunch of leaves was punctuated by the thud-thud-thud of apples dropping from laden boughs. Sunlight filtering lazily through the trees cast all that it touched in burnished gold, making patinas of leaf and bark and branch. A fox on the path pricked his ears and dropped his tail low to the ground as the wind blew voices towards him. They were happy voices, merry and light and melodious in a way that only one manner of voice could be, for they were elven. They belonged to kindly elves that a fox need not fear, but still he melted into the bushes. Perfectly camouflaged amongst autumnal reds and golds, he watched as the owners of the voices came around the corner.
“Look! There’s the tree that I was hiding in the first time we met. Do you remember?”
A fond laugh. “I could not forget.”
“Some of the trees are good about letting you hide when you’re in trouble. Others not so much. They think that it is funny to tumble you onto the ground right at the feet of the person hunting you.”
“Are you speaking from experience?”
“It only happened once. Twice. Or three times.”
“You ought to choose better trees.”
“Or get in trouble less. But why would I do that?”
“Why indeed.”
The fox twitched his nose and peered at the leather boots that stopped not far from his bush. On the other side of the path, Luthavar Faelindion-Baralinhil rested his hand against the rough bark of the oak tree where his life had changed five years ago. Only five years, he thought, since the father who had given him up at birth to save him from a life of torture and slavery in the darkest pits of Mordor had stopped beneath the very oak tree in whose branches he had sought refuge to delay returning home to his beloved adoptive father and the trouble that he was in. Sometimes, Luthavar wondered what would have happened if he had not climbed into the tree that day. If he had never been in trouble, if he had chosen a different path to walk along, a different tree to hide in. Would Baralin still have found him? Or was it that circumstance and fate had conspired to place both father and long-lost son in the right place at the right time? Had that been their only chance to reunite? A slim moment in time, never to be offered again. Luthavar couldn’t think so. He and Baralin were meant to have found each other.
“Sometimes the trees play tricks,” he said, keeping his voice low so as not to offend any of the neighbouring trees. “They say that you can hide but all along they intend to drop you on the ground at the most inopportune moment. Not this tree, though. She is the best.”
“I am grateful to her for looking after you so well,” Baralin replied, and the great oak rustled bashfully.
They walked on.
The path meandered like a river. It was on so gentle a slope that one might not realise that they were going downhill until they glanced up and noticed how the trees towered tall above them and the leaf littered banks ran up and away out of sight. Twists and turns led down to a little dell lying cold and dim in the shade, the fingers of the sun unable to stretch so far. High off the ground, an ancient bridge to nowhere arced across the dell and disappeared into the bank. Moss coated the crumbling stones. Here and there a spider scuttled between the cracks. Baralin made to pass under the bridge to continue their walk on the other side, but he glanced over his shoulder as his son hesitated.
“What is it, Lutha?”
“You have to…” Lutha gestured vaguely at the bridge. “Hold your breath.”
A quizzical smile appeared on Baralin’s handsome face as he turned back. “What do you mean?”
“The bridge,” Lutha clarified. “Legend says that you have to hold your breath when you walk under it or the Dark Lord will appear and drag you to Mordor.”
The words had been spoken. There was no way to call them back though Lutha would have wiped them clean away if he could. He froze, struck by horror, and Baralin came to his side as he drew a panicked breath. “Don’t, love,” his father said, placing one strong and soothing hand flat on his chest, the other on his back, steadying him. “Don’t tell me that you are sorry. You don’t need to.”
“No, I do,” Lutha said in disbelief. “That was the stupidest thing I could ever say. I’m an idiot!”
“Don’t,” Baralin repeated, more firmly this time. “I will not hear of you taking such names to yourself.”
“But I-”
“You spoke without thought. That does not make you thoughtless.” Deepest indigo eyes met clearest grey as Baralin lifted Lutha’s chin with a gloved hand. “I am glad that you speak to me without thought because it means that you are comfortable enough in my presence to do so. I never want you to feel that you must guard your words around me. I have taken no hurt, yonya. I promise you.”
“If you’re sure,” Lutha said in quiet misery. “But I’m still sorry.”
Baralin pressed a kiss to his brow and drew him close. For a moment they stood still in the chilly dell, each of them silently savouring what they had lost and craved for so many years – a father’s protection, a youngest child’s love. Not for either of them would it ever become something to tire of. When finally they drew apart, Baralin sat on a flat rock by the bridge and gestured for Lutha to join him. “I spare little thought for the Dark Lord and his dark realm,” he said, putting an arm around Lutha’s slim shoulders. “I think often of your mother and your older brothers and sisters, and your sweet twin Morfindir, but when I do they are free, running and playing and dancing upon the green plains where once I travelled.” Baralin glanced down at Lutha and lovingly tucked a lock of dark hair behind his ear. “And you are with them and we are all together.”
“That sounds nice,” Lutha ventured.
“Yes. A beautiful dream. Aside from those whom I loved and lost, I feel…” There was a pause as Baralin searched for the right words. “I feel detached from my captivity. The person I used to be died in the pits of Mordor. Much of that time and what went before it is shut away behind a locked door in my mind for which I have lost the key. It was another life, Lutha. You are all that matters to me now. You, and Thureneth, and Faelind. Now…” He smiled fondly and tapped Lutha on the nose. “Why don’t you tell me more about this cursed bridge.”
“Feredir tells the creepiest tales about it,” Lutha replied, eagerly seizing on the invitation. “He says that he has seen spirits and heard monsters, burning red eyes staring out of the gloom and whispers in the night and horses passing over the bridge though it leads to nowhere. I don’t come here that often and never at night so I’ve not seen or heard anything, but…well, I do hold my breath when I pass under the bridge. Just to be safe.”
“Of course,” Baralin agreed.
“So does Alphros,” Lutha added hastily. “Galad says that he doesn’t but I don’t believe him. Do you think that the bridge could really be cursed?”
Baralin glanced at the bridge and removed one of his gloves to run his hand over the old and cold stones. It came away green. Grimacing, he rubbed the slimy lichen onto the side of the rock. “No,” he said finally. “I do not think that the Dark Lord will appear if you fail to hold your breath under the bridge. I do not think that anything will happen. But legends are rooted in truth, so while I believe that something may have happened here long ago when the world was quiet and young, I also believe that you are safe here. Though perhaps not from spiders.” He walked featherlight fingers along Lutha’s neck.
“Don’t,” Lutha laughed, squirming away.
“Come,” Baralin said with a faint smile. “Let us walk under the bridge and return home.”
“Holding our breath?”
“No. Not holding our breath.”
“What if you carried me?” Lutha suggested. “That way, if there is a curse, it might not land on me because technically I wouldn’t be walking under the bridge.”
A wistful smile hovered about Baralin’s lips as he pulled his glove back on. “I will not turn down the chance to do something that I missed for so many years,” he said, and as he rose he swept his son into his arms so smoothly that Lutha gasped in startled delight. It was only a few short steps from the rock to the tunnel entrance that would lead them under the bridge, but Baralin carried Lutha those few steps, cradling him like the baby he had once been. When they got there, Baralin held on, savouring the moment, the feel of his last child safe in his arms, but then he pressed a kiss to Lutha’s hair and set him gently on his feet. “There,” he murmured. “But you must find your courage and walk through yourself.”
“Will you go first, Atto?”
“We shall go together.”
Lutha took a deep breath that tasted of ripe fruit and chilled air and the promise of rain on fallen leaves. He held it but let it out slowly at a meaningful look from his father. “Together, then.” He waited for Baralin to take the first step before following slowly. It was dark inside the tunnel and so cold that Lutha put his arms around himself to suppress a shiver. A smell of damp moss hung in the air. A drip of water made a soft plip as it fell into a puddle. The plop of a second drop followed immediately after. Autumnal wind chased them through the tunnel, toying with Lutha’s hair and making him gasp as it tickled his neck and his cheeks. He hastily batted it away until he realised that it was, in fact, only his hair and not a cluster of spiders falling from the ceiling. Still, he quickened his pace and emerged into grey daylight at his father’s side.
“Nothing happened,” Lutha said, turning to look back at the bridge which he supposed really was only old, smelly, and creepy.
“And nothing will happen,” Baralin promised. “You did so well to face your fear.” He kissed Lutha’s brow and looked down at him with a loving smile, and though Lutha knew that he had only walked under an old bridge, still he delighted in his father’s pride. “Now come, yonya,” Baralin said. “We shall go home and you can tell Faelind all about your triumph.”
Lutha nodded without hesitation, the prospect of seeing his other father bringing him as much joy as Baralin’s pride had. Together, they made their way out of the dell and back onto paths carpeted by golden sunshine and leaves that crackled and crunched underfoot. The bridge stood lonely and cold behind them, keeping its secrets close.
The very second they got home, Baralin was cornered by the cook with a query about the dinner menu for that night. The household staff had been suspicious of him in the beginning; most had felt sure that he had come with some nefarious plan to spirit Lutha away in the middle of the night, but with hard work and a lot of effort, Baralin had earned their trust and respect, and they acknowledged him now as one of Lutha’s fathers as well as a voice of authority in the house. At least when it came to dinner menus. Leaving Baralin to fend off the cook, Lutha slipped away and went in search of Faelind.
He found him in the same place he had last seen him – the study – and stopped for a moment to watch him. The usual feelings that stole over Lutha whenever he saw Faelind after being apart from him made an appearance now, warming him from the inside out and ushering a fond smile onto his face. In the same way that Lutha believed that he and Baralin were meant to have found one another, nobody would ever convince him that the same was not true of his adoptive father. Perhaps there were some who would say that it didn’t make sense, that it had never made sense, the half-feral little thief angry at the world and everything in it, and the cool and aloof Elder of Law and Justice. But Lutha thought that it was because of who they had been, not despite it, that it had always made sense, that they were always meant to rescue one another. As though pulled by the force of Lutha’s thoughts, Faelind looked up and smiled as their eyes met across the room.
“My little boy,” he said softly.
The familiar epithet made Lutha beam. Accepting it for the invitation that it was, he stepped further into the study. He thought that Faelind looked glad of the distraction, which was just as well because he excelled at being a distraction. “Guess where Atto and I ended up on our walk,” he said, perching on the edge of the desk and swinging his legs back and forth. “The Cursed Bridge. But we both survived.”
“I am overjoyed to hear it,” Faelind replied.
“Then sound less sarcastic,” Lutha chided his father with a laugh. “And guess what else? I didn’t even hold my breath when we walked under it.”
“Then you may report to Feredir that his stories are nonsense,” Faelind said.
“I suppose so. It is a little disappointing to think that the bridge is just a bridge,” Lutha admitted. “I wish that I knew where the stories came from. Things don’t get a reputation for being cursed for no reason, do they?” He waited expectantly for Faelind to agree, but his father only hummed noncommittally and glanced out of the window. Lutha felt his eyes widen in suspicion and he leaned forward to try and peer into Faelind’s eyes. “You know what happened at the bridge! Were you there?”
“Luthavar, how old do you think I am?” Faelind asked, and as he looked back Lutha was disappointed to see no hint of deceit or guilt in his eyes.
“I know how old you are,” Lutha retorted. “I don’t know how old the bridge is.”
“It has been standing for longer than I have, and whatever happened there was well before my time,” Faelind said. The answer did not satisfy Lutha, who folded his arms over his chest with a quiet humph. “You are correct that the bridge must have its reputation for a reason,” Faelind added in an attempt to mollify him. “I believe that something did happen there, long ago, and the nature of that something has become lost and twisted over time.”
“Atto thinks the same thing,” Lutha conceded. “He said that legends are rooted in truth.”
“And so they are. This legend has been around in one form or another for many years,” Faelind said. “For many years more the bridge will be a place for warrior initiations and dares between siblings and friends.”
“Warrior initiations,” Lutha repeated, both curious and hopeful. “Did you ever…”
A rueful smile made a fleeting appearance on Faelind’s face. “Naturally.”
“Did you get caught?” Lutha asked, and if he still sounded curious and hopeful…well, he made no apology for that. He loved hearing stories of his father, who he thought of as entirely perfect, getting into trouble.
“Naturally,” Faelind said again, dryly. “Dirnaith and I spent a night under the bridge after being dared by some older warriors. Most of a night, at any rate. We were caught by a passing patrol.”
“Were you in big trouble?” Lutha didn’t bother to hide his eagerness, but a dreadful thought came to him and he bit his lower lip as his smile faded. “With…with your father?”
“I was in big trouble, you will be delighted to hear, but not with my father,” Faelind replied, reaching out to give Lutha’s arm a comforting squeeze. “We were reported to our training master, who-”
“Galad’s daerada,” Lutha interrupted.
Faelind nodded patiently. “Captain Bregolas, yes, who gave us both a strapping and set us to fletching arrows for the rest of the day. Though he was dutybound to report the incident and our punishment to our parents, he only wrote one letter and that was to Dirnaith’s father. When I asked why, Bregolas told me that as Captain Nandirion already had an inordinate number of sons, dealing with one more reprobate elfling would be no trouble for him. I was grateful to Bregolas for shielding me from my father. As he often did,” Faelind added, his voice a little softer.
Lutha was immediately grateful to his best friend’s grandfather, too; Faelind spoke rarely about his father Elrain, but what little he had said over the years was enough that Lutha had no doubt in his mind that Elrain had been wicked and cruel. “What happened with Captain Nandirion?” Lutha asked, partly because he wanted to know, and partly so that Faelind need not dwell on thoughts of Elrain.
“Before facing Nandirion we had to face his older sons,” Faelind said, his jewel green eyes looking beyond Lutha into the past. “They had us running drills and exercises. Not Tirroval, though. He had spent a night at the bridge himself some years before and he thought that having a hand in our punishment would make him a hypocrite. He stood by and shouted encouragement, brought us drinks and ran us a bath at the end of the day, and he was there to sympathise after Captain Nandirion paddled us and sent us to bed straight after dinner that night.”
“That doesn’t sound like the worst punishment in the world,” Lutha said tentatively. “Compared to what might have happened if…”
Faelind finished the sentence as Lutha faltered. “If my father had found out. Well, perhaps. He was unpredictable and followed no rules but his own as to what misdeeds he thought required punishment. But you are quite correct, Luthavar; it was far from the worst punishment in the world. Though,” Faelind added thoughtfully, “I suppose every punishment feels like the worst in the world when it is happening. I defer to the expert on that point.”
Lutha waited expectantly for Faelind to clarify what he meant, but his eyes widened when his father only looked steadily at him. “Me? Ada!” He couldn’t decide if he was offended or delighted by the jest. Grudgingly, he supposed that he ought to be delighted; Faelind’s sense of humour was subtler than most, and it was almost always a joy to see it. “But tell me this,” he said, gently nudging Faelind with his foot, “which was scarier? The bridge, or Captain Bregolas and his strap?”
“We were young, and Bregolas was not so very hard on us. Still, where a strap is involved, that will always be the answer,” Faelind said with his usual restrained laughter. “As for the bridge, my little boy, believe what you will.”
“I might give it some thought before I settle on anything, but right now I’m going to see Alphros and Galad,” Lutha announced. “I have to tell them everything.”
“Well, perhaps not ev-”
“Everything,” Lutha reiterated firmly. “Especially that you and Dirnaith got into big trouble, because that’s funny.”
“If you must,” Faelind said with a sigh. “Just be home in time for dinner.”
Lutha nodded dutifully and hopped down from the desk. He gave his father a quick hug and a kiss on the cheek which Faelind returned with a small but fond smile. After helping himself to one of the sweets from the crystal bowl which had first appeared on the desk some years ago for his benefit, Lutha started for the door, but he didn’t make it far before another thought occurred to him. “Guess what else, Ada?”
“I couldn’t possibly,” Faelind said with the infinite patience that Lutha had come to expect from him.
“Atto picked me up and carried me to the bridge, though I did walk under it on my own,” Lutha was quick to add. “But he did it so effortlessly! He swept me up as though I was the smallest of babies! Do you think that you could do that?”
“Yes.”
Lutha took a breath. Then he stopped and frowned slightly. “You didn’t even think about it.”
“I do not need to,” Faelind replied.
“Prove it, then,” Lutha challenged.
Leaning back in his chair, Faelind considered him with his usual impassiveness. The only change to his expression was the slightest arch of his eyebrows. In the almost half century that had passed since Faelind and Lutha had become father and son, Lutha had come to know Faelind exceptionally well, well enough that he felt entirely comfortable to dare him so. Others might quail under such a hard stare from Elder Faelind, but Lutha still felt comfortable even though that stare was trained on him now. He stood his ground, going so far as to fold his arms over his chest and raise his own eyebrows in silent challenge. Finally, Faelind relented, rising fluidly with an exasperated shake of his head. But though he might be exasperated, still he lifted Lutha into his arms and cradled him with no more or less effort than Baralin had required.
“Are you satisfied now?” he asked, looking down into Lutha’s eyes.
“Yes, Ada,” Lutha said with a laugh. “I am satisfied. I would almost think that you had done it before.”
“But I have,” Faelind said, sounding mildly perplexed. “All the times that you have fallen asleep by the fire…how else do you think you got to your bed?”
“You carried me,” Lutha realised, and he was startled to feel a sudden sting in his eyes.
Faelind noticed the silver sheen of tears and hastily set Lutha on his feet. An unreadable expression crossed his face, though as Faelind took a step back, Lutha saw a hint of uncertainty there. “You wish that I had not carried you without your knowledge,” Faelind said. “Forgive me, Luthavar. If I had thought that it would upset you I would never have-”
“No!” Lutha protested. “I was only thinking, how lucky am I to be held so gently in your arms and to feel so safe there that I never even woke?”
“Oh,” Faelind said. “Oh, I…I see.”
Lutha closed the distance that Faelind had put between them and hugged him tight. “I have the best fathers in the world,” he whispered against Faelind’s chest. He didn’t add that he would fight anyone who tried to argue with him, because he thought Faelind might not like that and he didn’t want to ruin the moment. Out loud, he said, “I love you, Ada. I hope that you will always carry me.”
“Always,” Faelind said softly. Then, he hastily glanced away as though afraid to let Lutha see how touched he was. “Run along now, Lutha-nín, or you will have no time to see your friends.”
Still marvelling over how lucky he was to have two fathers who loved him – him, a former street rat who’d had to thieve and sell himself to survive and please his masters! – Lutha disappeared from the study, though not before taking more sweets. He took his time eating them as he went to the house where one of his best friends, Alphros, lived with Elder Feredir who was leader of the Hunter and Foresters Guild and easily in Lutha’s list of top twelve favourite people. Though Lutha was disappointed not to find Feredir at home, he cheered himself up by charming the cook into giving him biscuits while Alphros finished what he was doing; Feredir had taken on a pair of new apprentices, and Alphros had been delighted to accept additional responsibilities when Feredir had asked him to help oversee their training.
Duties completed, Alphros joined Lutha and they left to hunt down the final member of their trio at the home where he lived with his foster father and teacher Master Healer Nestorion. They found him lying on his bed with his legs crossed at the ankles and his chin propped in one hand as he leafed through the pages of a book. “Galadaelin!” Lutha said, shocked and gleeful all at once. “Have you been in trouble?”
Galad didn’t look up from his book. “This is a comfortable reading position whether one has been in trouble or not, Luthavar.”
“You didn’t say no,” Alphros observed.
Galad did look up then, regarding his friends through critical twilit eyes. “No.”
Lutha entertained the idea of giving Galad an experimental poke to the seat of his leggings. He decided against it for his own safety; Galad was not tolerant of such things. Instead, he clambered over his friend to sit on the bed with his back against the wall. “Atto and I went for a walk today. Guess where we ended up? The Cursed Bridge. We walked under it…without holding our breath.”
“Why?” Alphros asked doubtfully, autumn sunlight picking out strands of gold in his red hair as he sat cross-legged in the window seat.
“Because the bridge isn’t cursed and the legend about holding your breath is nonsense,” Galad said.
“Really,” Lutha scoffed. “Then answer this, o wise one: why, if you happen to be talking when we approach the bridge, do you pause in the middle of your sentence until we get out the other side? I’ll tell you why. Because you do think that the bridge is cursed and you do believe that bad things will happen if you don’t hold your breath. You just don’t want to admit it.”
Galad sniffed and turned to the next page of his book.
“I told Ada about it when I got home,” Lutha went on. “Guess what I found out? When he and-”
“You always say guess what then tell us before we have a chance to guess,” Alphros complained.
“Because you always guess wrong and I don’t have time for that,” Lutha said.
“No, it’s not as if we’re immortal,” Galad said under his breath.
Lutha flicked Galad’s thigh. Galad let his legs drop down over Lutha’s with slightly more force than was necessary. “Anyway,” Lutha said pointedly, draping an arm across Galad’s legs. “When Ada and Elder Dirnaith were our age, they got dared by some older warriors to spend an entire night under the bridge as a dare. Don’t you think that sounds delightfully horrifying?”
“It sounds horrifying,” Alphros replied.
“I was thinking,” Lutha began.
“No.”
“You’ve not even heard what I have to say.”
“I don’t need to hear it because I know what you’re thinking,” Alphros scolded him. “The answer is no.”
“Fine, but I’m going to say it anyway. I was thinking,” Lutha repeated, “I might spend a night under the bridge. I think that it would be a good shared experience for me to have with my father.”
Alphros stared incredulously. “Galad, are you hearing this?”
“Not by choice,” Galad said.
“I couldn’t do it by myself,” Lutha added. “I would need company. Don’t you think that it would be a fun thing to do?”
“There was a moment, not that long ago, when you asked whether we thought it sounded delightfully horrifying and I told you that it just sounded horrifying,” Alphros reminded him.
“Feredir would do it,” Lutha said.
“Invite Feredir then,” Alphros retorted, though he sounded less confident now.
“And Galad,” Lutha continued, “I bet Noendir has never spent a night under the bridge.”
“No, I think you’re right about that,” Galad said. “But there is no competition between my brother and me so that won’t work.”
“Celegnir and Breigon would never be brave enough to do it,” Lutha said under his breath.
Galad went so still that for a horrible moment Lutha thought that he had misjudged how his friend would react to the mention of his estranged eldest brothers, who had both, in their own ways, contributed to the unhappy childhood that he had endured in the north. Then, Galad closed his book and sat up – without a wince, Lutha observed with some disappointment, so he must have told the truth about not having been in trouble – and turned to face them. “So, what is the plan?” Galad asked.
“No!” Alphros protested. “If you do it I’ll have to as well!”
“Not if you don’t want to,” Galad replied.
“No, I will,” Alphros said miserably. “I won’t be left out. It should be three of us or none of us.”
“Three of us then,” Lutha declared with a triumphant smile.