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The storm came in the afternoon, eddying the clouds in fantastic whorls and shading them a malevolent green.
Since midday dinner, Maedhros had been shirking his every duty, shut up in the stifling attic with a book in hand that proffered sufficient distraction from the beads of sweat crawling down his neck.
There was an old cushion here, which expelled dust at the slightest shift of its tattered form. Maedhros had abandoned it as being too warm on this day, and while the sky still shone very blue and bright outside, he was seated cross-legged on the floorboards, turning page after page of The Deerslayer with breathless interest.
He did not consider himself a clever boy. He read a great deal, when he had time to spare, but there were chores to be seen to and brothers to mind. His grasp of Gaelic was deemed good, by his father; his grasp of mathematics, less so. During the long winter, there had been other troubles than keeping to his studies.
The memory of hands, his and not his, still stung.
With the winter behind him, Maedhros wondered, in moments alone, if there was something amiss in his heart as well as his mind. Something, perhaps, that had cracked apart under the change wrought by the preceding seasons.
Pottery was like that, if filled with frozen water. Water itself was like that, ice heaving and breaking when spring came.
When Athair went away, the memory of the family before was safe, easily attainable, almost sacred. Painful, too! Like the elevation of the priest’s hands had been painful, in the blushing innocence of childhood.
Maedhros thought of Sunday church, in their together times—riding home from a summer’s Mass in the open wagon. Athair drove the horses in front, with Curufin on his lap. Maedhros and Maglor used to sit with Celegorm between them, and Caranthir sat with Mother. After the twins were born, Maglor sat next to Mother with a twin for each, and Maedhros and Caranthir and Celegorm faced them.
Athair had always sung gaily on those journeys, the leaf-rippled boughs swaying above him and his song.
Athair had said, “Only the roundheads are silent on the Sabbath.”
Athair called Protestants by many names. Orangeys was an Irish one, but Athair had said (and did still; a year had not changed that) that the great unifying hatred which brought out Europe’s better half, as well as a pipkin of sympathetic Americans, was hatred of the Reformationists.
Charles Dickens was a Protestant. Many writers were, or else they were spiritualists.
Dickens, of course, was also English. Perhaps a greater sin? Maedhros did not know, but he kept his precious books out of Athair’s sight anyway.
He hid so much, these days. All summer, his secrets had grown, and they had none of winter’s necessity.
In winter, the gnawing pit of his stomach, the shrieking blisters on his hands—no one need know of those, who did not know already. He couldn’t hide from Mother; it had been right to hide from Maglor.
But Maedhros was growing up (at least, he believed that to be the trouble) and now he understood what it meant when the priest spoke of hell, the eternal torment of sinners. Sin had been a small thing, before. Now it was possible.
He understood, now, what passed between his parents when they were happy, and it was somehow as disturbing as what separated them when they fought.
Rude farmhands, whose acquaintance he had made through that same necessity of winter, had explained or hinted at the workings of life to him. It was all he could think of, in the doldrums of a safer life. He even dreamt of sordid things.
Speaking to Mother or Athair about it—about anything—was out of the question. A storm was brewing, and that was something he knew each morning and each evening, no matter what was worrying in the clouds.
Maedhros heaved in a deep, dusty breath of honey-thick air and turned another page of his book. Had Cooper lost his magic? His mind had strayed.
The trapdoor opened before he had a true moment to recollect himself. It was Celegorm, his curls full of hay. “There you are, bless my soul. If I had to spend another moment listening to Maglor and Athair—”
Maedhros shut the book. He was a little invaded upon, but Celegorm spoke plainly and never whined, which made him a better companion than most, on irritable days.
“Are they fighting?”
Celegorm shrugged. “Not truly. Athair said he hadn’t heard Maglor practice in a week. Now Maglor’s playing Beethoven. Loudly.”
Athair hated Beethoven. Maedhros didn’t know why. He loved everything Maglor played, the dark and lonesome melodies most of all. It was beautiful to see his brother hold such power over those depths.
Celegorm’s hair was overlong; his nails were rimmed with grime. He sat down companionably beside Maedhros and sniffed. “Lord, it’s a sneeze and a half up here. And hot as—the other place.”
Maedhros smiled at him; only half a smile, for he was still thinking of the unease below. “Everyone is out of temper today,” he said. “I know I am. It’s why you’ve come to find me, isn’t it? Something I ought to—”
Celegorm scoffed. “Everyone wants you downstairs, of course,” he said. “Doesn’t mean you need give a fig! Let Maglor fight Mother’s battle for her. That’s all it is, you know. She’s still stewing. Blast them all, I say. And Athair before anyone.”
“I hope you’ll only say that in the attic.” Maedhros marked his page with a cord of threads, which Caranthir had woven for him, this last birthday. “Come along. I’ve been away for—I don’t how many hours.”
“Two? Perhaps? Is it a good book?” Celegorm craned his neck.
“You’ll like it. You may have it whenever you like.”
“You could read it to me,” Celegorm suggested, pushing himself to his feet. He had been in the attic a thousand times; they all had. But Celegorm was an explorer no matter how familiar the terrain, and he nosed about curiously in the corners, while Maedhros considered what he ought to do.
After a moment, Maedhros rested his hot forehead on his hand. He had been worried about Judith; she loved the Deerslayer more than she was loved in return, and there were other evils ready at hand. Evils which might come easier, if she should choose to live by them.
“Perhaps,” he agreed. He knew they could not stay here, much as they might wish to.
Then thunder rolled.
Rain was flying down already. The drops were so large that they felt like paint-splashes against Maedhros’ face and arms. He was running, running hard, with Athair beside him, for the wind was rising fast and treacherous. Anything that was lying about—tools or fresh-planed boards or a raft of young seedling plants that had been sunning in the yard—must be gathered up and brought to shelter.
The firmament retched.
A hailstone struck Maedhros in the shoulder. It stung like a bullet. No—not like a bullet. He’d never felt a bullet.
He could not run for cover, yet. Doggedly, he shooed the terrified hens inside from their run and locked the chicken coops firmly. Breena, who was a lazy and complacent dog more often than not, was loping along, bedraggled.
Maedhros was glad of her company, but he feared the hail would hurt her, too.
Then Athair was beside him; Athair had him by the arm, steering him beneath the eaves of the barn. “We’ll wait it out here,” Athair cried, above the tempest roar.
Maedhros was trembling. Had anyone else been with them? It was strange to stand at the broad haymow doors with Athair alone, as if they two were the only creatures left in the world.
They two, and Breena, that was. She slunk in beside them.
“Did we do everything we should?” Maedhros asked.
“When it has passed, we will know.” Athair raked his wet hair back from his brow, and then, with an enterprising glance, he did the same to Maedhros. “You were quick on your feet, there.”
Maedhros did not know quite what to say. Half his mind was still in the stuffy attic with Celegorm, and half of him was here.
Athair sighed.
A moment was passing. Maedhros should have made some reply, perhaps.
How do you know him, Athair? The man at the door.
“It is highly unlikely that a tornado shall come here, Curufin,” Athair said, carving the second chicken with perfect, curving strokes. The first was already divided up among the plates. “During the year ’14, however, a fearsome one struck the Capital. Sent a few redcoats to an early grave!” And he laughed heartily, so that Curufin and the twins joined in.
Maglor looked sour.
Maedhros had washed his hands and his face before he came to the table, and changed into a shirt that Mother had ready for him when he came, dripping, through the door.
Lord, Mother had said. We watched at the windows for you—could not see a blessed thing.
“Feanor, don’t boast of death,” Mother said.
“The English are already dead, Nerdanel,” Athair answered, with the studied calm he always wore when he was preparing a witty sally. “It is only a matter of time before they, too, discover it.”
Maedhros thought of the storm: its quickness. Its insensible onslaught. The heavens did not understand what hell they released.
When night fell, he lit a candle in his room and read on.