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“I do not mean to cause you harm.” Celeborn whirled around from his spot near the window, crossing the room in three strides. “Why will you not believe I wish only for your good and the good of this city, when you befriend Dwarves and Maiar whose pasts we do not even know.”
“Why will you not enter the Dwarves’ kingdom?” Celebrimbor snapped back.
Celeborn’s face flushed. “Dwarves destroyed Doriath. They killed my King, my brother, my friends.”
“So did my family. My uncle slew your king and was slain in turn,” Celebrimbor said, rising from his seat to meet Celeborn. “My father killed your niece, and my uncle’s servants took her sons into the forests and left them to die. How can I believe you when I see how you treat those even more distantly related from those who have slain your kin?”
“It is not the same,” Celeborn said. His face was still flushed, bright red spots high on his cheeks.
“Why? Why is it not the same? You will not tell me why you distrust Annatar, you will not tell me why you will not speak to Dwarves as friends but will to me, you do nothing but oppose my friends even as I defend you to them-”
“I distrust Annatar because I have known too many Maiar. Even the best among them cannot understand elves fully, and we do not know enough of him to determine if he is among the best,” Celeborn interrupted. He ran a hand down his face. “Galadriel was right to call me a fool.”
“She does not trust him either, as the many letters she has sent show. I do not think she would call you a fool for distrusting him.” Celebrimbor glanced back at the desk in the corner of the room, and the enchanted doors the letters were hidden within.
“Not for that. She bid me tell you why I would speak to you and not the others, and I refused to listen to her. Nor did I listen to her advice to befriend the Dwarves.”
“Why did she tell you to befriend them?” Celebrimbor asked. Perhaps she had thought it wise for diplomacy, and yet that did not seem to be what Celeborn meant.
“Because she is one of the few who remembers how I insulted her brothers and her cousins when I first fell for her, and she wished me to not make the same mistakes as I fell for you,” Celeborn said softly.
Celebrimbor sat back in his chair with a thud. Celeborn could not mean what Celebrimbor thought, and yet Celeborn’s expression left little room for doubt.
“When?” Celebrimbor asked. There were other things he knew he should ask, but he could not form them into questions, not when he was still trying to work through the sudden turn in their conversation.
“It was soon after Oropher left. Ereinion was here for a visit, and he wished to send more emissaries to entreat Oropher to agree with him.” Celeborn glanced out the window again, though this time he frowned at the sight of the trees rising high outside.
Celebrimbor frowned at the memory. Gil-galad was still sometimes furious at Oropher’s refusal to cooperate with Lindon, but that meeting had been the worst of all.
“That does not seem reason enough for you to have developed feelings for me,” Celebrimbor said.
Celeborn laughed. “Does it not? You were the only one among the Noldor who disagreed with the idea. Even Galadriel did not speak against the idea, and I thought it would be left to me once more to argue on behalf of those of my kin who still cannot tolerate living under the rule of a Noldo. You rose from your chair and reminded them that while the Noldor had come to live in peace with only a few scattered memories of the worst parts of the past still walking among them, it should not be expected Oropher be as willing to do the same.”
Celebrimbor did not know what to say. After a moment Celeborn shook his head before meeting Celebrimbor’s gaze once more.
“It was enough for me, and now I must hope only that you will be willing to overlook my past failures in light of my efforts now. I wrote to Durin a fortnight past, offering my apologies that I cannot bring myself to step within caverns so different from the caves of Menegroth. He asked only that I not hide away the next time he visits you. It is not much, and yet I can still hope it will be enough. If it is not enough to convince you to give me a chance as your lover, than I can only hope it is at least enough to listen to my concerns about Annatar.”
“I will listen,” Celebrimbor said. Annatar would not be happy to learn of that, and perhaps more than anything that thought caused a sudden chill to rise within Celebrimbor. “I cannot promise more, not until I have thought more of the rest of what you said.”
Celeborn dropped back into his chair. “It is enough that you will listen.”
Celebrimbor could not quite understand how it would be enough, and yet Celeborn showed no signs of anger or despair. Perhaps that would be enough. He thought of the letter Celeborn had mentioned, and the explanations Celeborn had given for why.
It would be enough, he knew from the sudden pang in his heart at the way Celeborn began to speak of Annatar and again of Doriath, and how Doriath’s people had fallen when Melian left, though she had been among the best of the Maiar Celeborn knew. He could not return Celeborn’s trust with anything else.