Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Arafinwë never wanted to be king. 

He didn't need a crown or a throne or a title to be satisfied. Only to have his family, and to be able to care for them, to see them happy. 

He didn't care for the backstabbing, the cut throatedness, and the jockeying for position that power brought. 

He didn't think the power worth the price.

He was quite happy enough to live with his wife and children, splitting their time between Alqualondë and Tirion, ignoring the drama that his brothers seemed to generate by simply breathing. 

Let them be at each others throats constantly over the Heirship if they wanted. He didn't care for it. 

Which, of course, was why he ended up as the Noldoran.

Had he remembered that, actually, Irimë had left with their brothers and had no intention of returning, and that Findis had taken holy vows that prevented her from ascending to any royal title, he would most likely have not turned around. 

Of course, he hadn't stopped to think, too busy putting as much distance between himself and his brothers and their madness as possible. Too horrified by what they (and he) had done in the heat of their wrath and grief.

So, in a sense, it was his fault that he ended up with the crown. 

But no matter how it happened, the fact remained that Arafinwë, who had wanted nothing more than for his family to end their ridiculous infighting, ended up on the other side of the Sea to most of it, with the crown weighing heavy on his head. 

From a clan of dozens, the House of Finwë in Valinor had shrunk to only five:

Himself, his mother Indis, his eldest sister Findis, his two law-sisters Nerdanel and Anairë, and his wife Eärwen, who barely spoke to any of their people.

Arafinwë could not blame her. His sword had not been stained with blood at the harbour, but he remembered the look on her face as she stared at the crimson liquid adorning so many blades. 

The blood of her people, smeared over shining weapons of war in a sort of sick piece of abstract art, hundreds of silvery swords gleaming carmine in the orange light of the torches had twisted their stomachs like vices, had left every last one of the Eldar feeling sick and weak with horror at their own deeds.

And he could not bear it. Could not bear to stand on the deck of a ship still stained with the blood of Eärwen's people. Could not bear to watch her face as she stared fixedly at the drying crimson drops all over the white wood of the ship. 

So he returned, bearing up under scorn from both sides, but washing his hands of any more killing. 

He, at least was not made for war, and knew it. 

Nerdanel had not left in the first place, having walked from the preperations as soon as the first words of the Oath crossed her husband's lips. 

Anairë, their sharp, cynical healer had taken one look at the docks and turned around, her lips thin with rage and horror, and nothing that her husband or children did stopped her. Of course, they didn't even think to return with her.

Findis, the beauty of the family, her silver-golden hair sparking in the torchlit flames, and Indis, his mother, had never even left Tirion. They had taken one look at Fëanáro's eyes and refused to budge. They, at least, knew when to hold their ground. 

It brings the total of their house to only five this side of the sea.

Five elves left from a sprawling clan nearly three dozen strong.

It was a cold comfort that Tirion was no longer being ripped apart by the arguments of his family, when it was because his family was gone. 

Arafinwë despised the beautiful crown of mithril and gems that sat so lightly and delicately on his golden head. 

He hadn't wanted to be king anyway, and when it came at the price of his family, it was even less worth it than he had thought. 

He gives court in a hall echoing with those missing, because no matter how many places are filled, the people are still missing. 

It is a bleak, miserable existence. 

The Valar are taken up trying to make a new light for the world, and to help heal the Teleri, and they mean well, but there is really very little time left over for his proud, obstinate people. 

So the fragmented Noldor must draw together, and rebuild themselves, healing over the rents left by most of their society fleeing to a strange land. 

He thinks it would be worse if he didn't have the people he did beside him.

Indis, his mother, with her ties to the Vanyar, and her razor-sharp political mind does most of the diplomatic side of things, aided by Findis, who takes after her most of all his siblings. 

Together, they wrestle new treaties out of the Vanyar, hammering out deals more equal to the Noldor, as depleted and weakened as they are.

Eärwen, his beautiful, wonderful wife, is their liason to the Teleri, anointing the fresh, bleeding, hurting wounds in the once close relationship between the two peoples, and doing her level best to mend what was broken. In the end, Indis and Findis join her, the Vanyar being much more willing to negotiate than the mourning Teleri.

He lets them take those particular reigns with relief - growing up with his brothers meant that he knows exactly how to avoid conflict, and to bring calm with a few well-placed words, but he finds himself too used to giving ground to be able to fend for himself in the treacherous mire of diplomacy. 

Anairë and Nerdanel, his law-sisters, work themselves to the bone, setting up all kinds of practical aid for the Noldor who have lost their liveliehoods in the destabilisation of their once booming economy. Anairë's smooth, white hands that gave her her epessë become calloused, and Nerdanel's face becomes sharp and hollow. 

Arafinwë helps where he can, and many of the Noldor are heartened to see their king alongside them as they try to rebuild their shattered society.

The five of them do what they can to help, to make amends for what has been wrought by the family they so loved. 

It isn't quite enough, but it will have to do, and bit by bit, they reclaim their shattered lives.

Many hands make light work, and Arafinwë is King, but he doesn't have to do it alone.

*************

It begins one morning in early autumn, as the five of them are attending the re-opening of a bakery that had collapsed during the Flight. 

With how busy they are, it is rare for all five of the depleted House of Finwë to have leisure time all together.

Indis sits on the fountain edge, her golden curls falling almost into the water, restrained only by two small braids woven with tiny flowers of vibrant blue, and her posture for once relaxed in the loose cobalt gown that pools around her on the ledge. She looks young, younger than she is, and happier as she tilts her head back to drink in the sight of the stars only newly unveiled from the shadow of Ungoliant's mirk.

Leaning against the wall is Findis, her bright grey eyes snapping as her viridian skirts swirl lazily around her ankles, and her straight golden hair tossing like a river of liquid metal as she laughs, her mouth full of chocolate and cake. 

Anairë's hands are still for once, only occasionally moving to swirl in the waters of the fountain, her tense body almost as relaxed as her law-mother's, her sapphire blue eyes contemplative as she stares into the depths of the water. Her brother designed it, as Arafinwë recalls, and he wonders what memories she sees in the bubbling water. 

He watches them quietly from his spot at Eärwen's side, the two of them feeling a little guilty to still be together when everyone else in their tiny family has lost their spouse, has lost almost everything and everyone. But they still have each other, and they cannot resist the comfort the other brings in these dark, lonely days.

Nerdanel is in the middle of a bite of some delicious rasperry and pastry creation when her face suddenly pales. She swallows, and presses her lips together, placing one hand against the wall as if to support herself.

Before they can do anything but stand, alarm written over all their faces, her own drains of blood, becoming as white as chalk. 

A soft sob leaves her lips, and her hand tightens convulsively, crushing the delicate pastry into a mess of jam and crumbs. 

Then her eyes roll back into her head, and she collapses to the floor.

"Nerdanel!" In an instant, they are all by her side, worry foremost in their minds. 

Though she was the wife of the Crown Prince, Nerdanel was still a sculptor, still worked in and lifted stone day in and day out. She was strong, stronger than of them, who's crafts required less bodily effort. 

For her to collapse like this without warning was...terrifying. 

"Nésa, nésa, can you hear me?"

A fluttering of copper eyelashes and a soft sound is their only reply from the prone nis. 

Doubtlessly, once she has recovered, Nerdanel will be back to her usual self, utterly disgusted at having fainted like a swooning maiden. 

"Wh...Fëanáro?" 

A cold silence grips them all. 

Nerdanel hasn't spoken her husband's name since Alqualondë. She refuses to even acknowledge it. 

Anairë's lips thin, and her eyes narrow. "We need to take her to the Healers. I cannot discover what is wrong with her here, without any equipment." 

For a moment, Arafinwë hesitates, but only for a moment. 

Slipping one arm beneath her knees, and one beneath her neck, he lifts his law-sister with a grunt of effort, and takes a few experimental steps. 

While she is heavy, muscled and strongly built, Nerdanel isn’t an unbearable weight. He can make the short trip down a few streets to reach the healers. 

Most likely. 

His arms start to burn with the effort. Nerdanel is getting heavier by the second, but he presses his lips together and continues on. He started this, he will finish it. 

Determinedly, he ignores Findis and her unhelpful comments. 

***********

Anairë's face is white as she exits the room Nerdanel was given, and her lips are pressed together hard.

In the split second between her skirts clearing the doorway, and her closing the door with a snap, Arafinwë sees Nerdanel sitting upright in the bed, strong clever hands twisted in the embroidered sheets, and tears flowing thick and fast down her immobile, pale face. 

It is...unsettling. 

Nerdanel is always so strong. Calm and patient, and ever deserving of her moniker 'the Wise', she is rarely ever unsettled. 

That one glimpse has managed to hollow a pit of dread in his stomach. 

"Nésa?'

Anairë's eyes are downcast, and shadowed. She looks conflicted. "F...Fëanáro is dead."

Everything halts. 

They all look at her as if she has gone mad. 

Fëanáro...dead?

Surely not. He couldn't be. 

Of all of their family who went into Exile, his mad, untouchable, infuriating half-brother is the last he would expect to find death. 

His law-sister squares her shoulders. "Fëanáro is dead. And Nerdanel is pregnant."

For the second time in twenty seconds, Arafinwë's world spins. 

His mother sweeps past his immobile figure in a flurry of cobalt fabric, and breezes in through the door. 

"Yendë, what do you need?"

Her soft voice falls on all their ears, and it soothes and comforts their aching souls. Indis has always had that effect, her voice always just this side of singing.

Nerdanel, so proud and so strong, merely crumples into her step-law-mother's arms with a stifled sob. 

She shakes silently, breaking apart under the knowledge of her husband's death. 

The rest of them, one by one, end up huddled around her. 

The five of them mourn together, though they are not sure what they mourn. Fëanáro, or Finwë, or the Teleri murdered on the docks, or the loss of their entire family. 

Maybe all of them at once. 

Maybe none of them. 

Whatever they mourn, the outpouring of grief helps.

They weep for what feels like hours, but at the end, it is as though a cloud has lifted, and they can breathe again. 

Nerdanel places one hand over her abdomen where her eighth child rests, and one more tear streaks down her face. 

Silently, they all promise each other that this one, precious gift of a child will never want for anything, least of all love. This is their final chance, a way to bring a little beauty out of all of this. 

A child to love, and to live for.

**********

Nerdanel's strength is all but gone when it is time for the infant to be born. 

The Ambarussa had drained her fëa to the point that the Healers had said she would not be able to carry another child safely for many yeni. 

It has been only two since the twins were born, and not only that, but her worn out fëa is wounded by the sudden death of Fëanáro. She has had to sustain the child within her with her own fëa, for he could not aid her from within the Halls of Mandos. 

It shows.

Not outwardly, not for an elf. But in her eyes. Her eyes are dead and hollow, all the life sucked away by grief and stress.

By now, all that is keeping her alive is the knowledge that her child will need her on the other side. 

All of them are terrified for her, for Nerdanel who is so strong, but can only take so much.  

It is they who are by her side when the time comes, not Fëanáro, and not her sons.

The eight who should have been supporting and aiding her through this whole, nightmarish pregnancy are on the other side of the Sundering Sea, with no knowledge of what is happening. 

Instead, she has four, eclectic, broken elves with her, all of them afraid and angry and exhausted. 

And, as could be predicted, the birth is hard and long and messy, and Arafinwë is not the only one to feel sick at the end. 

But, finally, at last, it is over. 

It is over. 

An impossibly tiny babe with a tuft of silvery-golden hair at the top of her newly cleaned head is crying softly in the trembling arms of her mother.

The five of them huddle around each other, all of them laughing and crying as they stare at the precious, beautiful infant in Nerdanel's arms. 

"What is her name?"

Nerdanel's tired eyes scan over the tiny, perfect being cradled in her arms, and they light up with love, even as the life in them dims further, and her family are forced to place their hands beneath the infant to prevent her dropping from her mother's exhausted arms.

When she speaks, her voice is scarcely more than a whisper.

"Almarëa. Her name is Almarëa."

Almarëa. 

She is indeed a blessing.

Chapter Text

The first thing that Indis notices about her newest granddaughter is her hair.

It isn't Nerdanel's russet curls, neither is it Fëanáro's jet black sheet. 

It is the familiar silver-golden colour that appears so rarely, and only among the Tatyar.

Not quite Tyelkormo's golden tinged silver locks, nor Artanis' silver tinged gold waves.

A tuft of hair sticks up on the infant's head, an equal mix of gold and silver both. 

Just like Findis, her first, beautiful child.

Just like Miriel, her best, most beloved friend.

Neither gold nor silver, neither one nor the other, but both and neither. 

She strokes the baby's soft cheek, marvelling at how smooth and warm it is, smiling through her tears as the tiny rosebud mouth parts in the infant's first laugh.

Pale grey eyes crinkle up at her from Nerdanel's weary arms, and Indis beams down at them. 

There is such innocence in this child, such purity. It is refreshing to her weary fëa, a breath of joy unmarred by time and Arda Marred.

It seems like hours pass, the five remaining elves of the once proud House of Finwë curled up together around a single precious bundle of elfling. 

Indis could stay here forever, in this tiny bubble that feels so much like the halycon, vanished past.

Little Almarëa, impossibly tiny and delicate, seems like a china doll in her sculptor mother's arms, and Indis is not the only ome to wonder at her size.

Surely, surely that is not a normal, nor a healthy size for a newborn, even one born under such stressful and anxious times?

Yet Anairë and the other healers all insist that Almarëa is perfectly healthy, and more than strong enough. 

Indis cannot but look at Nerdanel's strong arms shaking with weariness, at her bright eyes so dull, and guess at the price of Almarëa's wellbeing. 

She has seen this before, in another elf she held close to her heart.

And Indis prays she is wrong, with all that she is, even as she knows she isn't. 

Even as her heart sinks and she blinks back tears that are not of joy and relief.

The knowledge sits like a stone in her stomach, hard and heavy and bitter.

And undeniable.

Like Miriel before her, Nerdanel has poured too much of her spirit into her child, has given too much of her very being to ensure the safe arrival of this precious bundle. 

Nerdanel's dull eyes lock onto her own, and she shakes her head, even as the energy the movement takes causes her cheeks to pale still further.

It doesn't take their skill in ósanwë for Indis to get the message.

She presses her lips together, against the words that want so desperately to tumble out. 

This is Nerdanel's day, and her decision. 

It is her law-daughter's choice, and she must abide by it, even as everything within her screams denial at watching another woman she loves so dearly waste away in such a manner.

Indis blinks the tears away and forces her stiff lips to smile again. 

The smile comes easier when her eyes fall once more on the tiny bundle of life cradled in Nerdanel's arms.

"You must acknowledge her, Nerdanel." She keeps her voice soft and untroubled, even as something within her screams that they are running out of time. This child must have one parent, at least. 

Nerdanel takes in a breath, and the light brightens a little in her eyes. When she speaks, her voice, while still weak, is less reedy. Perhaps, Indis is wrong. "Before Iluvatar in the Timeless Halls, before Manwë and Varda, I do claim this child as mine own daughter, to love, to teach, to nurture and to cherish, unto the ending of the world." 

She presses the customary kiss to her daughter's forehead. "I name thee Almarëa Nerdanelion, the firstborn daughter of my house." 

Indis is proud of how steady her voice is as she intones the next part of the small ritual. "Elen síla lúmenn' omentielvo, Almarëa Nerdanelien."

She is the oldest member of their house present, even though she is only Finwean by marriage. The ritual greeting falls to her, and she is glad of the excuse to press a kiss to the soft baby forehead, to close her stinging eyes and pretend that all is well. 

In that moment, Indis feels an aching grief for this tiny, innocent baby.

Poor child. 

What has she done to deserve this?

Born into a world with no light but the stars overhead, to a mother already half-dead with grief and weariness. Her unknowing father is dead in Mandos, her brothers and cousins are stranded, exiled, on the other side of the sea with no hope of return. She has almost no one and nothing, not compared to the cousins and siblings born in the Noontide of Valinor. 

"Indis...'' Nerdanel's soft voice jerks her from her thoughts. "Will you care for her?"

Indis takes the profferred infant in her arms, cradling her with the ease of long practice. "Of course, Nerdanel. I will love her as my own."

A wan smile crosses the horribly pale face. "Good."

Indis feels a cold shiver run down her back.

Thankfully, Anairë takes that moment to tsk over Nerdanel's condition and bustle them out, before shutting the door behind them. 

Indis hears the babble of the voices of healers in the room, and bites her lip. 

Not again. 

"Amillë?" 

She turns to Arafinwë at his soft enquiry, and forces her lips into another stiff smile. "I'm sure Nerdanel will recover perfectly. She is stronger than all of us."

She has to. 

In her arms, Almarëa gurgles and hiccups, only an hour old, but already so lovely and so loved. 

Indis presses another kiss to the soft skin of the baby's forehead and blinks back the ever-present tears that have pricked her eyes at the slightest provocation since her marriage bond snapped. 

*************

Nerdanel lasts one month.

She could have lasted longer, Indis knows. 

She would have lasted until her daughter, her last child, had memories of at least one of her parents.

She wanted to stay.

She wanted to see Almarëa's first word, first step, first everything. 

She was getting better.

She was going to be there for her daughter's life.

Instead, one month and four days after Almarëa's birth, her eyes roll back into her head and she begins to seize.

Nothing anyone can do helps. 

Three minutes after the seizure began, Nerdanel's hröa is empty, and Almarëa is an orphan.

Indis sits, staring blankly at the discarded shell of her eldest law-daughter, and wonders what happened.

She dimly knows that she is in shock. 

She remembers this sensation from a childhood spent under the stars in constant, ever present peril. 

It was just so sudden. 

Nerdanel is gone. 

Their family has been whittled down yet again. 

Now they are four, and an orphaned elfling not even a full month old.

Indis dimly wonders what on earth they have done to deserve this.

**********

It takes another month before a Maia of Vairë visits them, and explains that that moment when Nerdanel...when Nerdanel died, was the moment Maitimo's torture began.

The pain he had been experiencing had poured down his bonds, for how could he have known how to shut them off? 

He had tried, but it had not availed him.

Nerdanel had gone into shock at the sudden experience of what her son was undergoing, and her weakened hröa had given up under the torture.

Torture.

It is an ugly word. 

It barely exists in their lexicon. 

Indis stares unseeingly down at the baby gurgling and cooing in her arms. 

For a moment, silver-gold hair is replaced by russet, and she is looking down at Maitimo, the first, beautiful grandchild of her husband. 

A blink dispels the illusion, and her eyes see the infant truly before her again. 

Clutching the little bundle to her with a soft sob, Indis holds out her arms, gathering the three remaining relatives she has left.

Almarëa is hardly out of the womb, yet Nerdanel and Fëanáro are already both in the Halls.

And Maitimo, darling, patient Maitimo, ever kind, ever willing to smooth over some new fault, ever willing to extend the hand of friendship and family his father often withdrew. 

She cannot imagine Maitimo being tortured.

She saw torture, once, long ago, before ever she reached Aman, before even she was full grown.

Or rather, it's after effects, crawling out of the woods looking more corpse than elf.

Bile rises in her throat as she imagines beautiful Maitimo in that state. 

Arafinwë, Findis and Eärwen, children of Aman that they are, cannot imagine it, not really. 

She feels alone, even as they weep with her.

For how can they understand?

Her thoughts turn to Valimar, to her elder brother, who had seen more even than her. 

Ingwë remembers. 

Ingwë will understand. 

The next day, she and Almarëa are travelling to Valimar, for a visit.

To her brother, to the only person left she can truly trust to keep her safe.

None of the others come, but she expected that. 

They remain in Tirion under the watchful eyes of Anairë's parents, throwing themselves into work and rebuilding. 

Everyone has their own ways of coping.

Hers involves fleeing back to the comfort and security of her childhood. 

And to bring Almarëa, who she promised to love and care for, with her.

Indis makes the two week journey in ten days, so great is her hurry.

It is morning, and the bells of Valimar are ringing as she rides in through the open gates, Almarëa slumbering peacefully in a sling before her.

Ingwë welcomes them with open arms, and for all her age and station, Indis unashamedly weeps into her older brother’s strong embrace.

For the first time since Finwë's death, she doesn't have to be strong for her children, or anyone else. 

She can just weep, and be comforted. 

Ingwë only holds her close and hushes her soothingly, and she can pretend they are children again, playing by the shores of Cuivenien.

Chapter Text

It takes nearly an hour for her weeping to cease, in which time her brother has guided her up into the family living room, and her law-sister has gently lifted Almarëa from her arms.

Vaguely, she is aware that Elaurissë is rocking the baby and humming to her, even as she sends worries looks at Indis. 

Ingwë, bless him, only holds her the whole time, allowing her to cry without judgement or stricture. He knows her, better than anyone save perhaps her husband, and so he only strokes one hand through her radiant golden hair, rocking her gently. 

When she eventually sits upright, wiping away the final stray tears, he silently offers her a handkerchief and then tsks as he straightens her dress. "Nésa darling, you are a mess."

She bursts out into slightly hysterical laughter, which, while not good, is still probably better than endless desolate weeping.

Elaurissë sits gently down on her other side, and wraps an arm around her shoulders. "You should have come to us sooner, Indis. Stay here for a while, rest, and heal."

Ruefully, Indis shrugs, and takes Almarëa from her law-sister. 

"I can't abandon my children, not after they lost their father. I can't make them lose two parents in such quick sucession, I can't make them go through that, no matter the expense to me."

The three of them fall silent, the shadow of the past oppressive for a moment. Imin and Iminyë had vanished shortly before Ingwë and Elaurissë's bonding, and Indis had been only a girl still, barely half grown. 

Ingwë had been bonded hurriedly, shoved too quickly into the role of chief, and neither of the siblings had ever seen their parents again. 

Her voice is hushed and quiet as she blinks away the bitter tears still plagueing her.

"I can't do that to my children." 

"Oh, Indis." She is encircled in a warm embrace. "We aren't asking you to. Only to take a little time to heal, so that you won't collapse in a heap and flee to Mandos. A little time now, rather than much time later."

Almarëa coos from her arm, one clumsy, newborn hand reaching out to smack against where her heart beats. 

It probably means nothing, only an attempt to exercise her newfound mobility, but the gesture brings the tears back to her eyes with new force. 

Blinking them away, Indis presses a kiss to her granddaughter's head, and takes a shaky breath. 

Ingwë's hand smooths comfortingly over her head, and she smiles gratefully at the two. 

"Very well, I will stay. But only for a little while." Her eyes fall back to Almarëa. "I will not let her only memories of childhood be Valimar. She is Noldor, and with the Noldor she will grow great, yet," forstalling the next, obviously suggestion, "Nerdanel entrusted her care to me, and I accepted the trust. I will not break my troth and leave Nerdanel's daughter with another."

Twin hums in her ear announce their reluctant acquiescence. Ingwë and Elaurissë have always been ridiculously overprotective of her. 

***********

She is soon settled in her old rooms, in the same hall as the rest of her brother’s family. 

Looking around at the familiar place, she sighs, walking to the hastily found crib by her old bed to put down the drowsing Almarëa. 

Something about the room is jarring. 

The walls are hung with tapestries gifted from Míriel over the years, each one unique, and perfectly made. None have moved or been changed in the slightest. 

Stars wheel overhead in miriad patterns, gleaming and flashing as the light hits them. Even though the stars outside change, these are in exactly the same formation as they were when she last stood in the room.

Her bed is smooth and unslept in, the covers tucked in at the edges. Just as she left it.

Running her fingers along the rows of books she never bothered to bring to Tirion, Indis realises what it is. 

She has never seen it in darkness. 

Always, always the Trees have been shining, making the stars shine like fire, and the threads forming the tapestries bright and sharp. 

But now, the only light is the stars, and the glow of her lamp. 

And her room looks wrong. It was designed for light, not for darkness. 

Indis presses her lips together and sits down hard on the bed, rumpling it's smooth surface. 

She feels the urge to scream, to throw something, to run and run and run until she has run into the sea.

She cannot, she cannot leave. She is needed. 

Almarëa chooses that moment to stir, and Indis is quickly by the side of the crib, looking at the half-lidded grey eyes carefully. 

How often she has done this, leaning over a waking infant, waiting to see what it needs. 

But Almarëa only smacks her lips and sinks back into reverie.

Indis sighs, jiggling her legs and shaking out her hair. 

She needs to run. 

She needs to stretch her legs and feel the wind in her hair, and the world fall away behind her. 

For a moment, she hesitates, but a gust of wind blows in through the open window, and her resolve caves.

Slipping into the wardrobe, she finds one of the running tunics she left on her last visit. 

Within moments, she has stripped off her dusty riding habit, tossing it carelessly at the washbasket, and slipped the short, light tunic over her head. 

It is dyed a deep, bright blue, the colour of the bright sky when Laurelin was in full bloom. 

She pulls her hair out of the tunic neck and leaves it hanging loose and golden, all the way to her knees. 

Her feet are bare, the soles still as tough as leather from long journeys as a messenger, in days before the smooth stone pavements of Tirion were even a dream in her husband's brilliant mind.

Indis smiles as she looks at herself in the mirror. 

For a moment, she looks like her old self, before her best friend died and her life crashed down around her ears. 

Almarëa chooses that moment to wake up,  announcing her displeasure at her new state of consciousness with a strident wail. 

"Oh, sweetling." She rushes back and lifts the still far too small babe, cradling it against her.

Rocking and shushing the wailing infant, she feels the trembling restlessness in her increase, and she lets herself out of her room, walking swiftly through the busy corridors. 

"Arammë Indis! I heard you were back, but I didn't know that you had brought the child with you."

Ingwion comes striding up to her, wrapping her in a one armed hug that leaves the baby room to breathe. "It is good to see you, Arammë, and the child too."

He pokes at Almarëa's nose, and the baby bursts out laughing. "Are you not the sweetest thing in this dark city? Indeed you are, and you know it. "

Indis sighs and manages to smile. "She is sweet indeed, but still too small. I dare not leave her alone yet."

A look of dawning understanding appears on her nephew's face, and for once he shows his true age. Ingwion was born shortly after Ingwë and Elaurissë were wed, and he knew Míriel well. "I see. I'm sorry, Arammë I know Nerdanel was dear to you."

Then, lifting the baby from her arms, he rocks her easily and tickles her until she laughs. "May I care for her for a little then? My daughters will adore her, and if we have her, then you can run, as I see you desperately want to."

Grateful, Indis thanks her nephew, and hastens out of the palace. She warms up quickly, and then runs out of the courtyard, through the streets, aiming to reach the gates as soon as possible, so she can feel the living earth beneath her feet, and watch in fall away behind her. 

Running like this, bare feet slapping on the ground, tunic fluttering about her knees, nothing but the dim light of the stars to guide her, is familiar and comforting to her in a way that is well nigh holy. 

The light of the Trees no longer illuminates every blade of grass and leaf, throwing everything into harsh relief for the Trees are dead.

Instead, the stars shine above her, lending a softer air to the usually too-bright, too-sharp land.

The dim light, the grass and earth beneath her feet, the tunic and loose hair, all combine to make the years fall away. 

For one glorious moment, Indis is young again, running along the shores of Cuiviénen beneath the stars, the second child of Imin and nothing more. 

She can almost feel the leather message pouch flapping against her hip as she runs, wondering what message her father has for Tata now.

Almost, it seems that nothing has changed. 

Then the bells begin to ring for evening meal in the city behind her, and the illusion is broken.

She is worn and tired, hardly young, but not yet old. She is in Aman. 

She is the Queen Mother of the Noldor, a position Tatië had occupied (under a different title) for three yéni until she ran afoul of a pack of wargs.

Her law-parents have been much on her mind of late. 

Tatië and Tata are, she knows, in the Halls of Mandos. 

Finwë is there too now. 

She wonders if he has found them yet, and what they have said to him. 

If they think his remarriage wise, or a mistake. 

If they approve of her, the golden-headed child of Imin who ran from camp to camp with loose hair and laughter trailing behind her, swifter than the wind. 

If they think her lacking, when they had been so happy at his marriage to Míriel, who had been the pinnacle of all that the Noldor desired in one being.

She sighs and turns around. 

It would not do to miss the evening meal, and besides, there will be other days to run. 

Turning her back on the long open plains, and the lingering memories of times long past, Indis runs back to Valimar. 

The walls seem to close in around her, and the sound of the bells hangs heavy in the air. 

Ingwë and Elaurissë are waiting for her, with Almarëa perched in their arms and Ingwion only a pace behind them.

Chapter Text

The next morning, Indis wakes early, the sweet scent of the grassy plains wafting in through her window. 

She stretches and stands in one motion, rolling her neck and pulling a robe around her as she wanders over to the window seat. 

Darkness seems strange and jarring to her in the Undying Lands, but she still finds it less unsettling than some. 

In Middle Earth, the Quendi had, for the most part, carried torches when they had to leave their fire-ringed settlements, to ward off the Hunter and his ilk. They had travelled in large groups as well, all blazing with firelight and with their smooth spears held tight in their hands. 

But Indis, the swiftest messenger the Minyar had, did not. She had been, well, foolhardy. Reckless.

No torch for Indis, no long, unwieldy spear made for war. She had run in the darkness, alone beneath the stars, a knife strapped to her thigh and a blowpipe and darts ever ready to hand.

The latter were more for her parents' (and later brother’s) peace of mind than for any real need.

Her speed was her best defense, the swiftest of the Quendi in their earliest days, and even now the swiftest of the Eldar.

No creature had ever caught her, whether one of Morgoth's tortured beasts or merely a hungry wolf. She could outrun them all, swifter than the wind, her golden hair shimmering beneath the stars, her feet hardly bending the grass so great was her speed.  

Ingwë's skill lay in the spear, Ingwion's in his great strengtg, Elaurissë's in the deadly dance of the long, keen, knives. But for Indis, her skill lay in her feet. In sprints, in long treks, in races. But most of all in the journeys across vast lands, speeding across them like a comet of living gold, bearing messages to and fro between the chieftans of the three tribes of the Quendi. 

She can almost hear the frustrated howls as packs of wargs fall behind her, growling as her feet carry her farther and farther away. The thrill of the chase, whether as chaser or chased, never grew old. 

Indis sighs and dangles her hand out of the window, feeling the dark-cool air against her fingers.

It has been long, too long since she has run through forests, swifter than the evil snapping at her heels. Since she felt the rush that was courting death, and staggered into the safety of the settlement, laughing and breathless as the wargs bayed outside. 

A sound startles her from her thoughts.

Turning, she smiles as she spots Elaurissë's head poking into the room. 

Her law-sister's long hair is bound into a loose plait thrown carelessly over one shoulder, and a robe has been shrugged hastily on over a nightgown. Clearly, Elaurissë has only just woken up. 

Indis smiles and nods for her sister to enter.

Without a word, Elaurissë comes and sits beside her, looking distantly out of the window. 

She traces the shapes of the stars with one finger, as she always has, and Indis takes comfort in the familiar action. How many times had she spotted it from the corner of her eye, long ago in the dawn of their people's history? 

Probably more than her children have seen years, even added together.

She sighs, her breath catching at the thought of her children. Of the two in Tirion, pulling a shattered people back together. And of the two so far from here, journeying to the far off lands where she ran so wild and free and fearless.

Back to Middle-Earth, where the waters of Cuiviénen ran cool and dark beneath the shining stars. 

Back to Middle-Earth, where the dim grass beneath the great trees was rougher and sharper beneath the feet than the soft, perfect lawns of Valinor.

Back to Middle-Earth, where the wolves howled beneath the stars, and the bears grunted in the forests, and the wargs slunk through the tall grasses with blood in their teeth.

Her two precious elder children are going back to Middle-Earth, where they will have to fight for their lives every day and every night, and every second in between.

Orcs roam freely across the plains, and hunt elves and animals alike in the woods.

Shadows are thick and dark, and always you must watch to see that they are not forming legs and arms to grab at you.

Wargs howl and hunt even to the very gates of the small walled towns the Quendi built, and their gnashing jaws rip apart any who are unfortunate enough to happen across them.

And worst of all, the Hunter, riding through the land on his dark steed, snatching elves without warning and vanishing, taking them to his dark master in Utumno, to be twisted and tortured until nothing remained but hate and dark cruelty.

Middle-Earth is beautiful, but deadly and beautiful, and fear is constantly strangling her. 

What do her children know of battle? What do they know of death, of fear, of grief or pain? 

They are born of Aman, and they are not ready yet for war.

In her heart, Indis knows they will be slaughtered, and she thinks she will fade for that knowledge.

She had wanted to return, more than anything.

Had wanted to see if stubborn old Nowë still lived, and if Itarillë and Tyelperinquar pulled his beard as she herself had.

Had wanted to find Elu who they once thought she would wed, who had vanished and never come to claim her from her brother's house.

Had wanted to run through the woods and mountains with wargs baying at her heels, catching only her laughter.

But most of all, she had wanted to be there for her children.

Had wanted to hold Lalwendë as she laughed because otherwise she would have to weep.

Had wanted to guide Nolofinwë as he was forced to make choices as bitter as they were harsh.

Had wanted to interpose her own body between dark, rusted blades and their young, untested bodies.

She had wanted to be there, to teach them, and protect them, and love them.

But she could not leave Arafinwë and Findis, her golden, innocent children. She could not abandon them as she had been abandoned. 

So she stayed.

Even though it felt as though she were wrenching her heart from her chest to watch her elder son and her younger daughter march away. 

"Indis. Nésa, where are you?"

She shakes her head, and leans it against the wall. 

"Far away, I am afraid. With a son and a daughter I will never again see, as long as they live."

Elaurissë's face darkens, and she presses her lips together. "Oh, Indis." 

Willingly, Indis goes into the elder woman’s embrace, hiding her head in the other's shoulder and blocking out the world for one blissful moment.

It is quiet, and still, and she can pretend, for a single, silent, second. 

Then Almarëa wakes, and starts to cry, and Indis has to get up and rock and soothe and feed and change the tiny infant, and push back the dark thoughts that constantly invade her mind. 

**********

One day fades into the next, then one week into two, then three, then a month, and within the blink of an eye, Indis finds that it has been three months.

Three months she has abided with her brother, and even in the Deathless Realm, changes have been wrought by the swift passing of time. Deathless has never meant Changeless, after all.

Lady Varda's stars are brighter, for the last of  Ungoliant's murk is being blown away by Lord Manwë's winds, and they shine clear and sharp down on the darkened land. Almost it seems as if Telperion were shining once again, though only at Waning.

It is better than nothing, and far better than the thick murk that had blanketed Valinor for days after the Darkening. 

The very air seems clearer and sweeter now, and Lady Vána has been at work - flowers are growing again around Ezellohar they say. Certainly, they are springing to life with greater profusion each day, so that the very grass seems hidden with the bright blooms.

But it is Ezellohar they speak of most, and she has been putting it off long enough. One of Lady Nienna's Maiar has been helping her work through her grief and resentment, and he has been suggesting a visit to the Trees for a month now. 

Olorin can be very aggravating when he puts his mind to it.

Indis spreads her cloak out beneath the spreading boughs of a large oak tree and unfastens the wriggling Almarëa from the sling on her back. She lowers the tiny silver-gold bundle to the cloak, and folds herself cross-legged beside the cloak.

The five month old scrabbles happily over the fine material, uncoordinated fingers tracing the general direction of the lines of embroidery with great concentration. 

She is glad of the excuse to simply sit still and be, to think with her heart pounding and the blood rushing through her at a speed to equal even the Eagles. This is how she thinks best, out of breath and full of adrenaline. 

A babbling noise reaches her ears, and she turns, startled, from where she had been staring pensively out to where the Trees once stood. Somehow, Almarëa has managed to tangle herself up in the cloak. 

Her impossibly bright eyes stare up out of a nest of jade green damask and gold thread, huge and innocent. 

One tuft of hair flops down over the bright eyes, and Indis cannot help but laugh. 

She lowers herself to her stomach, to better look the five month old in the eyes. "And what, just what, do you think you are doing? Hmm?" 

Unable to help herself, or the broad smile spreading across her face, she taps one finger against the soft baby nose, and pulls Almarëa to her. 

Humming softly between soft breaths of laughter, she unwinds the cloak from the accident prone babe.

It is nice just to sit here in the cool twilight beneath the stars, the wriggling, warm baby on her lap, and the fresh, sweet air filling her heaving lungs. 

Leaning back, Indis closes her eyes, listening to the soft sound of the breeze rustling the grass, and her granddaughter babbling happily.  

She really should be going on to Ezellohar. 

To see the dark, withered forms of the Trees, and to look on the scorched earth, where Finwë and she had stood to be joined so long ago. 

To see the dead relics of a byegone age, that died with the husband she was never meant to have.

To see the husks of what once was, and to accept that it is no longer.

Indis sighs and suppresses a snort. Wise Olorin may be, but right now, this is doing her more good than looking at the shells of the beautiful trees, which had sprung into blossom as Manwë and Varda proclaimed her and Finwë one. 

The tears come less easily now, but she still finds them pricking her eyes at the thought of her wedding. 

"A-u-i." 

A baby's soft, unused vocal cords are hardly going to make intelligible sounds yet, but the soft pat over her heart is clear enough. The attempt to bestow the title of grandmother on her is enough to melt her cracked, broken heart.

Pressing a soft kiss to the sweet, beloved little head, she fastens Almarëa to her back once more and runs on. 

She will not find closure sitting weeping beneath a tree. 

No, she is Minyar, of the Spear-Elves, and action is their way. 

Ezellohar is barely more than a league away, and she can see the small, dark forms of the trees that were once so bright. 

It is...curiously painless. 

Flowers cover the mound, in every colour of the rainbow, and it seems less a grave, than a memorial. 

She runs faster, and Almarëa laughs on her back. 

Chapter Text

The Trees stand as tall as they ever did. 

Indis finds herself curiously struck by that, as she looks up from the base of Ezellohar. 

Somehow, it seems wrong that these drained husks should yet be towering into the sky.

But here they are, as tall as they were when they sent light drifting over all the land.

The light, however, is gone. 

Instead, two tall towers of dead, black wood soar into the night-dark sky, distinguishable from it only by the lack of shining stars in their outline.

The absence of Telperion's cool silver light, and of Laurelin's fiery gold is even more striking when she is staring up at their dark, withered trunks. But, whether thanks to Lady Nienna, or Lady Varda, or any other of the Valar, or even simply due to some last drop of virtue in the Trees, Indis can sense no taint on the flower-covered place. It feels as clean and pure as ever.

Almarëa starts to wriggle on her back, and she jerks from her thoughts to unfasten the sling and balance the five-month-old on her hip.

"Is that better, Alma?" 

Her only answer is a gurgle, the infant too busy straining to reach the bright, beautifully coloured blooms, probably brighter than anything she has seen in her painfully short, dark life.

Indis is once more helpless against the smile that pulls at the corners of her mouth.

The innocent curiosity of so infinitely precious a child is as good for the fëa as even Olorín's most tried and tested methods.

"Do you like the flowers, sweetheart?" She walks up the slope of Ezellohar, halting at the darkened base of what was once Laurelin. 

The tree of gold was always held dearest by the Vanyar, and it is the lost of its fierce, bright light that they mourn the most. 

She places one hand against the dark wound in the once smooth golden bole and sighs.

Finwë and her were married here, between the Trees. He had stood beneath Telperion, and she beneath Laurelin, and the Aratar had blessed their union before all of Valinor. As they were pronounced one, the Trees had burst into bloom, and it had been said that never were they so bright as then. 

A single stray tear falls from one blue eye.

Wiping it away, she blinks hard and tries to focus on the beauty, rather than the pain and regret, of the memory.

Rather than wondering, as she always has, if it was right to wed Finwë when he had promised himself to Míriel-who-is-gone and she had been all but promised to Elu-who-was-lost.

"It is a shame you will never see the Trees in bloom, little one. You would have loved them so much."

Almarëa only laughs up at her, and reaches once more for the flower-carpeted sward beneath their feet.

Smiling, Indis sets her down, and watches as the babe crawls through the lovely blooms.

It is easy to ignore the stray, bitter thought that Almarëa knows not bright colours, only the dim, faded ones that come with this perpetual twilight. 

Easy through practice, and nothing else.

She sits cross-legged with her back against Laurelin-that-was, and absently follows the clumsy movements of her granddaughter with half an eye as she wanders in memory. After all, she has raised too many children to let one so young wander unchecked,

"Your Atto and Ammë were married here as well, Alma."

Of course, Almarea does not reply. She is too young to speak more than disjointed vowels, and too absorbed in the flowers anyway.

It probably wouldn't interest the baby even if she was paying attention, young as she is, 

A giggle reaches her ears, and when she sees what elicited it, she cannot help but laugh too. 

A butterfly is perched on her granddaughter's outrstretched hand, and the baby has paused mid-crawl to watch it. 

For a moment, all three, nís, infant and butterfly are still. 

Then, Almarëa's attention is caught by something else, and the butterfly flutters it's wings and vanished as she moves her hand. 

"A-u-i!" She grabs at a flower, and Indis' blood turns to ice.

The flower has eight, large, tapered petals, and many smaller ones. It is a deep, bright, vermillion, but silvery lines radiate from the centre outwards through each petal.

It is an exact replica of her stepson's sigil.

Of all the flowers on Ezellohar, Almarëa had to find that one.

Suddenly, the stars seem very cold, and the darkness even darker.

Forcing her suddenly stiff lips to obey her, she manages to smile at the baby.

"It's lovely, sweetheart. Are there any more like it?"

Thankfully, the question is enough for the grey eyes to light up, and the little one crawls on, eagerly searching for another of the vermillion flowers.

Indis leans her head back against the dead trunk of Laurelin and tries to still her shaking hands.

To be suddenly faced with that symbol again, and paired with Alma's bright eyes, is a nasty shock,

She has not been reminded of her stepson so sharply since his death. It is...curiously painful.

Why would Ladies Yavanna and Vána allow flowers like these to grow here?

It is not merely the Vanyar who journey to Ezellhar, and never has been. Many a Noldo and Teler also come, some to mourn, some to heal, some merely out of curiosity.

Why would flowers the exact image of Fëanáro's star be growing here?

"Healing is never achievable by avoiding the reason you need it."

She will never admit it, but the only reason that Indis doesn't shriek at the sudden reply to her unvoiced question is that she recognises the soft voice before she can do more than draw breath.

Schooling her heart still pounding from fright, she pastes a cool smile on her lips and turns to look at the Maia who spoke.

"Elen síla lúmenn omentielvo, Olorin. What brings you to Ezellohar this fine day?"

He has taken a strange form today, one of soft drapings, with large mournful eyes and quietly smirking mouths peering through layers of grey mist.

In theory, it resembles an elven form, but the fluttering grey membranes are flesh not fabric, and his body bends and sways in the soft breeze in a manner that suggest his form has no more substance than simply layers upon layers of living gossamer.

He blinks his eyes innocently at her, and two of the thicker membranes rustle as he spreads them out after the fashion of bird wings.

"Why, to see the granddaughter of my favourite patient of course."

Indis raises an eyebrow, and Olorin's eight mouths grin as he raises exactly half of his own. Two can play at that game, but it is hard to win when your opponent will always have more eyebrows than you.

She gamely tries to outstare the Maia, but a gurgle from Almarëa distracts her, and Olorín laughs. 

Almarëa is crawling after a slow-moving butterfly that pauses at every possible flower and is an impossibly bright yellow that changes to a rich brown as she watches.

Turning back round, she looks sardonically at him. "Who did you bribe to distract her this time?"

When first she came to Valinor, it was hard to imagine the strange, uncanny Maiar looking anything but unsettling. 

Yéni upon yéni later, she looks at a being of silver gauze with many smirking mouths and eyes shining with the light of Ilúvatar, and can see through the eldritch strangeness to the sheepish side eyes and twitching smiles. 

"Only a friend. Aiwendil is a gentle soul, and wouldn't hurt a fly, let alone an elfling like Almarëa."

Indis sighs and leans her head back. 

She promised to trust Olorín, and trust him she shall. "If he turns out like Tilion, I reserve the right to ask Lady Nienna to have my sessions with someone else."

The soft grey membranes shift in an approximation of a shrug. "I wouldn't blame you."

Peering over to check that the Maia hasn't led Almarëa off the side of the mound, she realises Olorín's deflection. "So, why are you here, Olorín?"

Four of his mouths grin widely. "Lady Nienna said, and I quote, 'Ezellohar is a place for memory and thought. The Queen Mother of the Noldoli could benefit from both.' So, here we are."

"Here we are indeed."

Side by side, they look out over Ezellohar. It is green and bright and lush, with birds and bees and insects buzzing in the flowery grass. Elves and Maiar alike wander over the hill, some in groups, some in pairs, some alone. It is full to bursting with life, save for the dead Trees looming darkly over all. 

Yet even at their very roots, bright flowers grow and children play. 

Even at the very spot where two of the most evil beings in Eä drained the light from Arda, there is life and beauty and hope. 

And it touches something within her, something that swells and grows, like a bubble. 

Indis examines it carefully, not touching it for fear of bursting it, and loosing what it contains.

Golden memories swirl around within her, pressing against her mind with unusual urgency.

Something wants her to walk back, to live through her memories once again. 

Her eyes narrow as she turns to Olorín. 

Ezellohar has changed from what it was, clearly, and she has a fair idea of how, and to what.

The infuriating Maia only smiles, and she rolls her eyes, but an exasperated smile is curving the corners of her lips as well.

Olorín is a friend, and she trusts him, and so she is not afraid as she lets the memories wash over her.

Her life has been long, for she was born by the starlit waters of Cuiviénen, and the elves are young yet, but she is one of the eldest of their race. 

There is much memory within her.

Fëanáro stands before her, a child with a scraped knee and stubborn trembling lip, who frowns and sulks and mutters up at her even as she sings his grazes closed, but who also presses the fruits of his experiments into her hands almost as often as into her husbands, as a youth with shadowed eyes and who spits cutting, spiteful words at her, but who also sits and plays with her children for hours with a strange wistful look that is almost love, as a man with seven sons and a proud heart who lashes out at her and names her children imposters and her love false but still allows his sons to name her grandmother and still gives every one of his nieces and nephews fabulous gifts on every festival and begetting day and -

- and Finwë places his arm around her, sitting beside her as the two laugh and weep together, and speak of the woman they loved equally but differently, as the rings on their fingers shine, and sometimes at night it is Míriel's name he cries in his dreams but so too does she, for both have evil memories of a life in a land long forsaken, and equally it is always she he sees when they are together, not Míriel's ghost, and they fight and make up and fight again, but they always make up afterwards, because Míriel had died with so many unresolved arguments left hanging, and Elu had stormed into the forest and never returned to reconcile, and neither she nor Finwë could bear to let that happen again, not again, and -

- and Findis sits at her feet, her beautiful brave firstborn, quiet and good and thoughtful, and no one has ever known quite what her eldest has ever thought save for Fëanáro alone, and Findis is too proud to ever open herself in such a way, and Indis loves her dearly and she worries for her distant beloved child as Findis grows and becomes a quiet and distant and thoughtful woman, as she swears herself to Varda's service and forswears her blood rights as a princess of Noldor and the Vanyar but not her love for her family, as she still returns ever to Tírion and to Valimar, and never truly leaves them even though she has always been quiet and distant in a way that Indis herself will never understand and -

- and Nolofinwë brings his intended before her, and his eyes shine with worry, but also with trust as he asks for her permission to wed, and he pleads with her to stay with him in Tírion, not to follow her husband to Formenos, but she sees the mistrust in his eyes already, even as the love still shines there, and time passes, and her son's trust in her cracks and shatters and she can do nothing, but be glad that his love remains strong, even as he keeps secrets from her that once he would have confided in a heartbeat, but as he weeps in her arms and spends hours pouring out inanities to her too and - 

- and Irimë laughs and twirls around her, sleeves floating in wide billows as she leaps and sways in an intricate dance of which only she knows the steps, and she falters and stumbles, but recovers, and sweeps her arms even wider to make up for it, and she is brave and bold and laughing always, even after her father's funeral, though her laughter sounded like screams and her eyes were wet with tears and - 

- and Arafinwë runs side by side with his twin around her, gold streaming in pennants behind him, and she watches as he falls and stumbles and hurts himself, but also gets back up, and he is steadfast and strong, stronger than all his other siblings put together, and she is so proud of her youngest, so proud of his strength and his kindness and his wisdom as they rebuild a tattered people and -

- and her many grandchildren parade past in flashes, of yéni filled with laughter and light, but also with tears and arguments, as Artanis and Curufinwë shout and scream but also laugh together and drag the other into mischief, as Irissë and Tyelkormo tumble inside covered in dirt and trailing a pack of barking hounds, as Carnistir and Turukáno design and build and rule impossibly fair cities in their imagination, as Findekáno and Maitimo and Findaráto talk and joke and stroll through the markets, three heads of jet and gold and blood fire laughing together, as -

A pat to her knee brings her out of the haze of memory, and she realises tears are streaming down her face. 

The horrible ache in her heart is back, but the ache is less now, more like a bruise than an opened wound.

Olorín's eyes have melted into two huge, starlit ones gleaming behind a thin veil of living gossamer, and she can see only one small mouth twisted in concern. 

"It was not too much, was it? Changed as it is, Ezellohar is not always conscious of the limitations of Elvish minds."

Chest heaving as she gulps in air, Indis shakes her head. "I think...I think I needed that. To walk in memory with those I loved once more - to see them as they were before Moringotto twisted everything once more."

She purposely used her stepson's name for the enemy, and knows this didn't go unnoticed by the ever-observant Olorín. However, he lets it pass unchallenged, and she wonders.

"You cannot avoid Tírion forever."

Indis laughs in his face, ignoring how it sounds ever so slightly like a scream.

"I'm not."

A multitude of shining silver eyes are bent on her, and she shivers.

"Almarëa Nerdanelien is of the Tatyar not the Minyar, Indis Iminien. Do not deny her the chance to be so."

He vanishes, and she turns back to the baby. 

Of course, she is perfectly happy. Olorín doesn't know what he's talking about.

Almarëa crawls up to her at that moment,  eyes alight with wonder and innocence, babbling nonsense at a mile a minute. 

The butterfly touches the earth, and becomes a strange being of tree bark and rabbit fur, with eyes that seem to be knots of wood and a quivering rabbit mouth that should not be able to form intelligible words. 

"He is right you know. Olorín always is."

And Aiwendil melts away. 

Indis bites her lip until the blood comes.

Chapter Text

Almarëa sits on the floor by her grandmother's feet, her toddler hands unusually steady as she stacks the blocks on top of each other. 

A soft humming spills from her lips, a tuneless, wordless thing, totally unlike how Arafinwë remembers Makalaurë's childhood songs. 

She beams up at him as he walks in, struggling to her feet. "Tôrada!" The little girl's voice is high and sweet, a little higher than usual with surprise, and he is sure Nerwen's voice was lower, but perhaps he is wrong.

Pushing away the thought of his daughter, Arafinwë crouches down and holds out his arms as Almarëa comes toddling towards him. She does not deserve to be constantly measured against those who came before her. She is herself, their little blessing, not any of the beloved elflings they miss so desperately.

The child is light when he lifts her high above his head, her silver-golden head thrown back in delighted laughter. 

She does not look like Tyelkormo. She doesn’t. 

His mother smiles softly as she stands to greet him. "Yonya, we didn't expect you for another week yet. What a lovely surprise."

The Maia sitting beside her shifts as he too rises, inclining his head of streaming mist to the Noldoran before he melts away into a wisp of silver smoke and floats away out of the window, back to Lady Nienna's abode in all likelihood.

Arafinwë shifts his niece to one arm, and embraces his mother. He buries his head in her golden hair, and for one shining moment, he can pretend to be a child again, the King's third son, with a glowing future ahead of him. 

She seems to sense this, and her arms are around him, warm and strong, and Arafinwë lets one silent tear slip from his eyes. 

He is so tired, so tired of being the strong, sure King his people need. 

If Amillë were in Tirion...

Before she can sense it, he cuts the thought off. She is hurting too. 

His father's death hurt her horribly, and she responded by fleeing back to her elder brother. 

She responded by abandoning them, he doesn't think. 

He doesn't. 

He knows, intellectually, that she needs time to heal, and that her brother is the closest she can get to Imin and Iminyë, both countless yéni dead, closeted still in the quiet, dim Halls of Mandos.

He knows, intellectually, that she needs this as much as he needs her, as Findis and Eärwen and Anairë need her, dealing with the loss of their children as she is dealing with the loss of hers.

But his heart tells him that his own mother has left him, just as Miriel left Fëanáro. 

The one tear is joined by another, but he pulls back before the number can grow any more.

"It is good to see you, Ammë."

And it is.

It is wonderful to see Almarëa, who practically lights up the whole room with her bright laugh and bubbly chatter. 

He feels better here in Valimar, with his mother and his niece. 

"Are the others not visiting with you this time yonya?"

"No, Ammë, they are busy back in Tirion. I barely managed to get away long enough for a quick visit."

The words have the slightest tinge of bitterness, and he catches her tiny flinch, the catch of her breath. 

Even at his angriest, he has never been able to hurt his mother without a sick twinge of guilt.

Almarëa's wriggling grows wilder.

"Tôrada! Down!" 

He obliges quickly, before the agile little body can slither from his arms and dash it's fragile head upon the floor. 

Instantly, she is crawling off, back to her tower of blocks. 

Arafinwë turns back to his mother quickly enough to catch a strange look on her face, but she smoothes it out into a smile. 

"Come yonya, sit with me and tell me what has passed with you."

Gladly, he sinks down beside his mother and pillows his head on her shoulder. 

The words spill thoughtlessly from his lips, telling her of petty quarrels and little deeds, and the many small happenings in Tírion that build to a mountain of pressure, everyone looking to him for answers that he doesn't have.

His mother holds him to her and smooths one calloused hand over his hair, and whispers comforting nothings in his ear, and Arafinwë finds himself relaxing for the first time in a long while. 

But, as with all things, his tale of petty woes draws to a close, and the Vanyarin side of the family takes that moment to spill into the room.

His cousin Ingwion wraps him in a warm, enthusiastic bear hug with a shout, and Arafinwë laughs with what little breath has not been squeezed out of him. 

Ingwion never changes.

Aunt Elaurissë pulls her son gently off his cousin, folding Arafinwë in her own tight embrace.

************

Before he knows it, two days have passed, and he must needs leave early tomorrow.

Even this much time away from Tírion is probably more than he should take, but he refuses to be cut off from his mother. 

It is Findis' turn to visit next month, and he looks round the large, airy room his mother uses with a sigh. 

He will not see it again for several months at the least.

Indis smiles and embraces him, bidding him goodnight.

A bubble of sick anticipatory disappointment rises into his throat.

He pushes it down, and takes a deep breath. This happens every time he visits. He should be used to this. 

"Ammë. Will you return to Tirion with me?"

Her golden head begins to shake in the negative, and then she hesitates. 

Bright blue eyes rest on Almarëa, playing some sort of chasing game with Ingwion's daughters, and then switch back to him. 

Something softens in her face as she looks at him, and she reaches one hand out to stroke it over his furrowed brow. 

"One löa is hardly enough time to heal, my son." Against his will, his shoulders slump. "But I do not have that luxury."

If ever Arafinwë has heard sweeter words from his mother's mouth, they cannot have been recent. 

He grins, wide and happy. "Thank you, Ammë."

************

Uncle Ingwë is sad to see them go. 

He has grown accustomed over the last few months to seeing his sister regularly, to having her step-granddaughter constantly underfoot, yet Arafinwë cannot help but be glad anyway. 

Ingwë has had his mother and niece long enough. The Noldor need their queen again, and the royal family need Almarëa. 

He feels a little bad when the tiny tot starts to whimper, reaching out her arms to the Vanyarin royals, and seemingly confused as to why they are leaving the only home she has ever known.

But his mother is quick to shush and comfort her, to bounce her on her hip until she is giggling again and ruffle her hair until she is squealing and smacking the offending hand with her own. 

Arafinwë leans down from his horse, and his mother hands the toddler up, before she embraces her brother one last time and swings up onto her own steed.

The two of them (and the guards who insisted upon following him, and have indeed followed the King since the Darkening and Finwë's death, alone and without protection) ride out of the beautiful city, the hooves of their horses clattering on the pavement until the sound is replaced by the muffled thud of earth. 

Before them stretch the long, wild plains of Aman, leagues and leagues remaining to travel before they reach Tírion. 

Indis laughs, and gives her horse his head, racing before him within a breath. 

Smiling himself to see his mother so happy, Arafinwë urges on the stallion that bears him, accompanied by his niece's delighted shrieks.

He can hear the exasperated sigh of his guard captain, but not even the slightest twinge of guilt accompanies it. 

After all, he will only bring his niece home for the first time once.

When they do at last bring the race to an end, his mother is lengths and lengths ahead of him.

She circles back around, laughing, and leans from her saddle to lift Almarëa from him and settle the toddler in front of her.

**************

The days of journeying stretch out longer and longer, but thankfully Almarëa is more than happy to switch riding between him and his mother, giggling madly each time the riders pass her between them without breaking stride.

Her sincere, unfiltered delight in every thing that they pass is a balm to many an aching heart in the cavalcadse, and Arafinwë can only thank Iluvatar that she is the kind of toddler who doesn’t particularly mind being handed around and doted on by large groups of people. 

Strangers even. 

It hurts a little that he, her own uncle, is still, despite her adoration of him, little more than a stranger. 

Determinely, he does not think that he would not be so had his mother not fled to Valimar and taken the newborn babe with her. 

He doesn't. 

He doesn't. 

The words slip out anyway.

"It is good she isn't afraid of me. Most of my half-brother's sons despised strangers as I recall."

His mother flinches, hearing the bitterness behind the statement, and her eyes fill with tears. 

"Oh yonya." She reaches across and places a hand on his shoulder, warm and strong, and Almarëa pats his arm where he holds her before him. "I swear, I never meant to cause you more pain. It was cruel, and thoughtless, and not the action of a loving mother. Had I stopped to think, I would never have left, I swear. Can you ever forgive me for my cruelty?"

Arafinwë looks into his mother's blue eyes (vibrant even in the faded colours of this unending twilight), framed by her long golden hair, and he sees his own face reflected back at him. 

His own pain. 

His own grief.

His own bitterness. 

For the first time perhaps, he understands his mother's flight with his heart as well. 

For would he have not done the same, had the crown not weighed him down?

Tears blur his own eyes. 

"Always, Ammë."

She laughs, even though his ear catches it as more of a sob, and tucks his hair behind his ear.

"You are too forgiving for your own good my son. Take care your heart does not bring your more grief."

The shadows in her eyes deepen, and he remembers once more that his mother is more than a wife, queen, and mother. 

She was born and bred in the wilds of Endórrë, and she is harder than any of them formed in the peace and plenty of Aman.

Not for the first time he wonders just how much she felt of his father's death for it to affect his mother so, who has always been so strong.

Whatever she felt, it was not a quick, painless death. That much he knows. 

"Sire."

Frowning slightly, he turns back around, raising a questioning eyebrow.

"Yes?"

The guard clears his throat. "We are approaching Tírion sire."

"Ah, yes, thank you." Arafinwë feels himself colour a little. 

Damn him for not noticing. 

The group urges the horses on as one, galloping across the last stretch of plains into the city of the Noldor.

Chapter Text

The sound of horses' hooves in the courtyard reach her ears, and she starts up, tired as she is from the long trek down the mountain.

"Arafinwë has returned!" 

Within seconds, the three of them have hurried down to the courtyard, eager for news of their niece. 

Findis reaches the doorway first, and halts in shock. 

Golden hair blazing beneath the light of lamps and stars alike, her mother is swinging down from the saddle. 

"Ammë?"

Her voice is almost inaudible, yet Indis still hears it. 

She turns and wordlessly opens her arms in the same movement.

Findis rushes into the embrace, nestling her head against her mother's shoulder and closing her eyes. 

Vaguely, she hears Eärwen and Anairë exchanging their own greetings with her mother, but she holds tightly to her, still trying to make herself believe that Indis is really, truly back.

Her mother's hair is soft against her eyelids, and her dusty riding clothes wrinkle in her tight grip, and she can hear the soft thudding of a heartbeat, the first sound she ever heard.

For the first time since Indis left for Valimar, Findis feels safe.

A tug on her skirt distracts her, and she sighs. 

"Not now Laurefi-" 

The name stops dead on her lips, and she looks away from the pain and understanding in her mother's blue eyes. 

Her son was grown yéni ago, and he is on the Grinding Ice with his uncle, the impassable sea of ice.

He is not a child, safe in Aman. He is not sworn to Varda's service as she is or Manwë's his father is and because of that he has left them. 

He was always too bold and brave to be happy with their simple life on the mountains and now he will pay the price, she knows it in her bones and in her Lady's sad eyes.

Biting her lip, she looks down.

Bright grey eyes greet her, wide and smiling innocently, framed with waving hair of mingled silver and gold. 

"Arammë Findith?"

The lisp brings a bittersweet laugh to her lips, and Findis kneels down to sweep her niece into an embrace.

If she half-closes her eyes, then it is almost as if her son were a child once more. 

"Findis."

The warm hand on her shoulder is soft and infinitely gentle, but it is also firm. 

She nods and opens her eyes, pressing a kiss to the silver-gold hair. 

"Welcome home, Alma darling."

The large eyes stare curiously up at her.

"Home, Arammë?"

"Yes, darling." Findis stands and balances her niece on her hip, linking her free arm through her mother's. "This is home."

Almarëa looks suspiciously up at the walls of the Noldaran's abode, then back at Indis. 

Findis tries her level best not to be offended. Of course Almarëa would turn to the woman who has been the one constant throughout her short, dark life. 

"This is home, Haruni?"

She smiles at her granddaughter, and her arm tightens through Findis' own. "Yes, sweetheart."

The three of them walk in through the doors, and Almarëa clutches onto Findis' robe as the shadows pass over them. 

A little morbidly, she wonders if the child has some vague memory of being carried through these very doors behind Mahtan and Alaphindië at her mother's funeral. 

Certainly it would have left an impression. 

Findis bites her lip to distract herself. "Mahtan and Alaphindië were here yesterday, Ammë. They came for news of Alma."

A stricken look passes over her mother's face, and her stride falters.

Findis watches as her proud eyes are downcast, and feels a sort of sick thud.

She has never liked seeing her mother hurt. 

"I had not meant to deprive them of their grandchild."

Almarëa leans over and pats her grandmother awkwardly on the shoulder, gaining a watery smile in return.

"Your actions had ramifications on others, Ammë, as all actions do." 

The cool note in her brother’s voice startles Findis considerably. 

While Arafinwë was indeed the most hurt by their mother's departure, having always been closest to her, she had not thought him to be so...bitter. 

For an entire löa, he has not given a single indication of anything but understanding their mother's position, at least to her.

Suddenly Findis wonders if she knows her brother at all.

For though she had already been sworn to Lady Varda for a Year as they count it under the Trees by the time of his birth, her vows did not bind her eternally to Taniquetil.

She spends nearly as much time among the Eldar as she does the Ainur, and she watched her brother grow from an infant to the king he is now.

But the boy she remembers could never speak so to their mother, nor hold a grudge against her. 

Anairë comes up beside them and places an arm about her law-mother. "I understand, Amil, I did the same thing, as did Eärwen, as does Findis."

All that Indis can manage is a brief smile, but it eases the newly stern lines on Anairë's face.

So, a little broken, a little hurting, but together, the last shards of the once-great House of Finwë walk up the large staircase that was carved by Nerdanel long ago.

***********

Indis sits to her son's left as they eat, Almarëa on her other side. 

The little one is now able to eat solid foods, but the mashed potatoes and other assorted vegetables are, as with any infant, ending up more spread around her in a mess than in her mouth, despite Indis' best efforts.

Particularly as Almarëa seems to have taken a dislike to parsnip, and is constantly trying to tip over the bowl containing them.

But not onto the table, oh no that would be too easy. 

She seems to be aiming for the rug. 

Just like every infant ever to sit at that table.

Indis hurriedly pushes the thought away, but it is too late.

While she was trying to avoid the image of the dozens of children who sat at this table in this chair and tried to spill their food onto this rug, Almarëa suceeded.

Well, in part.

The bowl is on the floor, but right-side-up thankfully. 

For a moment, there is silence, and then they all burst into laughter at the tot's disappointed face. 

It is good to laugh with her family once again.

Laughter changes their faces, smooths away the changes so that they seem, for one moment, just as they did a lifetime ago when loss was a stranger to them. 

Arafinwë's bitter, cold eyes soften, and the tired lines fade as he laughs, his head thrown back. 

Eärwen's quiet, sad eyes sparkle to life, and she covers her mouth with one hand, her shoulders shaking with mirth.

Anairë, sweet Anairë, with her once-loose hair bound tightly up and her once-bright gowns austere and plain, laughs with no restraint, her eyes sparkling with mirth but also with pain.

The last toddler to sit here and spill their food was little Itarillë, Anairë's granddaughter.

Her eyes fall on Findis, who was quiet and frozen with grief, but the laughter softens her, and tears glimmer in her eyes like the first melted drops of snow.

It was a good decision to return, she decides.

She has been healed (or partially at least), but they have not. 

They need her, and she will not abandon them again while she draws breath.

If she herself is killed, she is seriously contemplating remaining Unhoused to watch over them.

While no longer talked about, it was hardly unusual. 

The protective fëar of those who had been cut down often clustered about their remaining relatives, unable to do much but doing what they could.

Certainly at least one of her parents had remained.

On several occasions, the wind had changed in the nick of time for the snorts and snuffles of approaching wargs to reach her, or a twig had snapped to draw attention away from her.

And once, a whisper had drawn her off the path, just before the Hunter galloped past, his pack of red-eyed hellhounds at his heels.

She would do the same for her children if she had to, but all the same she hopes that they have found peace in Lord Námo's Halls now.

"-më?" 

Indis blinks and refocuses. "Oh, I'm so sorry darling. What did you say?"

There are several smiles passed around the room, and the mischief in them lightens her heavy heart.

"We asked if you wanted Maltien stabled next to Sárocco, Amil." 

Her eyes narrow at Findis' blithe statement, especially when the others all nod to back it up.

At least her children are smiling again. 

***********

She doesn't sleep in her accustomed room that night.

The bed would be too cold and hard without Finwë beside her, too large for one slender elleth on her own. 

She would rattle in the too-empty room, like a wild bird in its cage.

And whenever she moved or breathed, the abscence of his weight or breath or scent would hit her once more like a physical blow.

No, she is not yet ready to face the rooms where she had spent so many happy years with him.

Not yet. 

Not for years, maybe not until her granddaughter by marriage and in her heart is grown. 

Maybe not even then.

She is no longer used to loss, no long able to soldier on through grief and horror because she must.

Yéni upon yéni have passed since death last touched her in Míriel's death, and that itself was countless years after they had left Middle Earth for Valinor, where death was all but unknown. 

Death is not a normal, accepted part of the cycle anymore. 

It is a horrible, violent thing that comes at the worst moments, out of the blue, to shred apart the world. 

No one had lost anyone in Valinor save for Míriel. And now, in such a short space of time, the Noldor lost their King, and the Teleri were slaughtered on their own docks.

Indis traces the lines of embroidery on the coverlet absently, following the elegant lines with one finger. 

Whoever made it is skilled indeed, but no match for Míriel Þerindë. 

"Haruni. Up, up!" 

She smiles down at the raised arms, and lifts the light bundle with ease, placing the tot down on the bed beside her.

Almárëa is painfully light, always has been. It is no fault of her own, or of anyone else's.

There is a simple, painful reason: Nerdanel had only so much strength left in her, and so much of it went to keeping the babe living. What was left was barely enough to see her birth the child without dying, let alone ensure that Almárëa was as sturdy as other children.

"Pwetty." 

She smiles as the little girl clumsily pats the swooping lines, giggling to herself. 

No matter. 

Light the child may be, as though made of nothing more substantial than gossamer, but she is hardly frail. 

"Yes, Alma darling. It is very pretty isn't it?"

The unexpected voice makes her jump, only a little. 

Without turning, she holds out her arm. "Come here, yonya." 

Wordlessly, her son kneels down beside her, placing his head in her lap as he did centuries ago, when he was but a child himself.

Indis cards her hand through his long golden hair. 

Obviously, he has something he wants to say, but she will not push.

Arafinwë will speak in his own time, as he always has.

So she will wait, and watch over her youngest boy, able to pretend for a few blissful moments that all is well.

Olorín's voice intrudes into her mind at thar point. A memory, not osánwë. It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live, my friend.

She isn’t really. 

Not with Almárëa so near anyway.

Losing focus around a child so young and impulse-controlled is always a recipe for disaster. 

One eye on her granddaughter, one on the fire in the hearth, Indis strokes her son's hair and waits for him to speak.

Chapter Text

Her first memory is of Haruni. 

She remembers being held close, hearing the shallow elven heartbeat right next to her ear, and curling further into the warm embrace.

She remembers looking up into pale blue eyes, blue like the lamps which shine without fire or smoke, and being comforted by the fierce, bright light burning behind them.

She remembers batting at the long silky threads of gold that fell down around her, brighter than even Lady Varda's stars, and twice as warm. 

Haruni is safety, security, comfort. 

Haruni is the one to whom she runs after nightmares. 

Haruni is the one to scoop her up and cuddle her after a fall. 

Haruni is the one who tucks her in and sings her to sleep. 

Almárëa loves Haruni, her first memory, her first protector, her fiercest guardian. 

She does. 

She loves Tôrada Ara too, almost as much as she loved Haruni. 

He is the Noldoran, so he has less time than his mother to run through the echoingly empty, bustling halls of the palace after her. In what time he does have though, he is kind and indulgent, and probably spoils her too much. 

Almárëa watches him in court sometimes, aloof and regal on his throne, but kind also, and she wants to be just like him someday. 

She loves him. 

Really, she does.

Just as she loves her Arammë Findis, who is always singing, her voice lilting from one tune to the next. Alma can always tell when Arammë Findis has come down from Taniquetil because suddenly the echoing halls are filled with a fey music that none of the minstrels can match. She loves her aunt dearly, who will abandon any work or task, no matter how great, to sing for her and play with her. 

Judged too young to know, she has no idea why her aunt (and her grandmother, and her uncle, and her other grandparents, and her other aunts), seems so sad and lonely sometimes even when Uncle Orwalauro is with her.

But she feels the ghosts that haunt the corridors.

Arammë Anairë is quieter and sterner, but she still cuddles her after a fall, and guides her clumsy, childish fingers into forming pretty patterns of needle and thread with infinite patience. Her clothes are dark and stern and scary, and yet she has too many beautiful dresses for Alma to count that she never wears, lovely airy things as brightly coloured as flowers. She lets Alma play with them sometimes.

But her favourite Arammë is Arammë Eärwen. 

For it is she who teaches her to dance. 

The graceful, sweeping motions captivate the tiny child like nothing else, and she whirls in her aunt's wake, following gentle corrections with ease. 

It is as if she has always danced, despite having not quite a score and a half of löa to her name. 

She loves them all, would love them even if they were cold and distant, but adores them, loving and protective as they are. 

She does. 

She does. 

But...

Sometimes. 

Sometimes, she wakes from reverie with tears spilling down her cheeks, and a horrible ache in her chest. 

Haruni says it's her heart that aches so, and says that they all feel it too, which is all well and good, but no one will ever explain it further. 

Even Haru Mahtan and Haruni Alaphindië won't tell her, and they indulge her in practically everything. 

She feels that it has to be something very important, and very bad, if the grandparents who sneak her out into the square to play with the few other elflings in the city, who bring her to the forges and let her watch the bright metal be shaped, who whisk her away on long rides into the woods that last for days and days, won't tell her. 

And while she does understand that they think she is probably too young to know, she is almost thirty löa old, and it is her heart that feels like something has been ripped out. 

It is her right to know. 

She has a right to know why she dreams, and what she dreams of. 

No one will explain them to her. They tell her that they're 'just dreams'.

But she's little, not stupid. 

Sand in your eyes means your dreams have been visited, everyone knows that. It means that Lord Irmo and his Maiar left you a message that night, one that you should not ignore. 

Nor does she intend to.

The soft, faded light that always visits her dreams, always with the harsh, burning light, the two prescences that fill the aching emptiness, soothe it, and wrap her in warm, steadfast love, they are should mean something to her, maybe even the world.

But whatever, or whoever they are, she should know.

She should know why they love her so much that it warms and comforts her for hours afterwards, why the love is mingled with grief and regret.

She should know why she loves them too.

The broken elf on the cliffside, the one with hair as red as Haru Mahtan's, who looks at her with wide eyes and mingles wonder and hate and tentative curiosity in one breath, he should be closer than her dreams, she knows it. He should be so much to her.

But he is only there when she dreams, and she doesn't even know his name.

The six elves by the lake, the twins who look like Haru Mahtan, the smith with eyes as grey and vivid as her own, the hunter with hair the same shade as that on her head, the clever trader with the same pointed nose, and the sad minstrel-king with the same long, clever fingers as Haruni Alaphindië, they all feel as if they should fit within her, somewhere, somehow. 

They do fit. 

When she dreams of them, she feels better.

Like something missing has been restored, however briefly.

She only feels whole in her dreams. 

And the knowledge only deepens the hole within her.

Because she has so much. 

She is so blessed, but she wants more. 

She isn't satisfied with what she has been given.

Even though she knows she should be.

**********

Almárëa rubs the dust from her eyes as she blinks them open. 

Haruni is bending over with a smile, and she smiles back. 

"Good morning sleepy head. Are you finally joining us this morning?"

Nodding, she scrambles onto her feet and lifts her arms.

"Up, up, Haruni!"

She is a big girl, and doesn't normally need to be carried, but the cliff elf was in a bad mood last night, and there were thick, horrible, raised lines all over his back that dripped what had to be blood, except she had never seen anything like it before.

The sight was yucky, and made her feel funny and small and afraid inside. 

It had been a huge relief when the dream had moved on almost immediately, to the quiet hall with the two prescences that wrap her in love. 

All of that doesn't mean Haruni doesn't give brilliant hugs, or that she can't enjoy being carried, because it makes her feel safe.

The golden-headed woman laughs a little, and hoists Almárëa onto her hip, wrapping her strong arms around her and pressing a kiss to the top of her head.

Alma takes the opportunity to wind her arms around Haruni's neck and cling tight, so she doesn't get any ideas. 

"My, my, someone's clingy this morning."

The playful tap on her nose makes her wrinkle it and hide her face in Haruni's shoulder. 

It only makes Haruni laugh more.

Which is good. Haruni needs to laugh, or at least that's was Arammë Findis said. Alma thinks that all her adults need to laugh more.

"Do I get a clue as to why?"  

She shakes her head. "Bad dream. Not saying."

Haruni thankfully only sighs and carries her over to the washstand, wiping her face briskly with the cloth. 

"Well, let's get you ready for breakfast in any case."

The water is cold, and Alma does not like it. 

She doesn't understand why they have to get up at a certain time when the light is always the same. 

Can't they wake up later?

It's not like it'll be any darker. 

And she'd get to sleep more.

She sulks and ponders it all the way through Haruni washing and dressing her. 

She doesn't even notice when Haruni puts her in her favourite white dress, the one embroidered with the pretty golden flowers.

The colour only catches her eye as Haruni picks her back up to walk her through the corridors, and out to the terrace, she supposes.

It makes her smile, because Haruni always knows her better than anyone. 

Haruni always understands. 

She doesn't need strange dream people. 

She already has her Haruni, and Tôrada, and everyone else. 

Alma smiles and wriggles until Haruni puts her down, so she can run and climb onto Arammë Anairë's lap. 

From the sad look on her face, Almárëa doesn't think her quietest Arammë had any nice dreams.

Hugs are desperately needed here, and she is most happy to oblige. 

Chapter Text

It is night, or what passes for night in the Treeless time they live in. 

The lamps have all been dimmed to near-complete darkness, and Tírion upon Túna is silent, it's few residents all but asleep. 

Wind howls through the empty streets.

It whips through empty houses, stirring the dust into little whirlwinds, flapping the faded tapestries and hangings, tumbling the delicate, abandoned ornaments, trinkets, and other possesions onto the floors of the echoing homes.

It batters against the occupied houses, rattling the windows and doors, shaking roof tiles loose, and howling out over the wide plains, out over towards the sea to the east.

Near one dark window set into the wall of the palace at the highest point of the city, a tall tree waves in the wind, the twigs tapping against the glass.

Inside the room, Almárëa's half-lidded, glassy eyes refocus sharply.

"Haruni?"

There is something out there, she is sure. 

Outside her window, something rustles and taps against the window, and she shivers. 

Haru Mahtan and Haruni Alaphindië had taken her to the square that day, and her cousins Calmacil and Istimiel had been there, and a whole host of other children - eight altogether!

They had all played together, and when the lamps were dimmed, they had huddled around the nearest fire and told scary stories. Istimiel's older brother had told stories about urqui, dark, twisted things that served the Hunter, and through him the Great Enemy. 

He had said that they were all that was left of the Quendi who were Taken - empty shells twisted and bent, with nothing left but hatred and wicked thoughts. Or at least, that's what he said his books said. 

She hasn't gotten that far yet, so she couldn't say - Haruni's lessons have only taken her to the end of the Age of the Lamps. 

But, Istimiel's brother is almost grown up, and Haru Mahtan says that he is studying to be a poet like his mother Elemmírë, so he must know. 

It must be true. 

She hadn't been afraid of the urqui then, when the fire shone bright and her playmates were huddled with her, but now, all alone in the dark, she is afraid.

The noise comes again. 

"Haruni? Tôrada? Arammë?" 

No, she is a big girl now, and she is not afraid. It is just the wind. Whatever it is rustles again and a little cry of terror leaves her lips. 

What if it's the Hunter? What if he's here to take her from her bed, snatch her away, and twist and torture her until there's nothing left? 

Almárëa starts to cry in earnest.

Suddenly, the door opens, and in rushes Haruni, golden hair practically glowing by the blue light of the lamp she carries. 

"Alma, sweetheart, what is it?"

She doesn't want Calmacil to call her a cry baby again, so she only holds up her arms to her grandmother. "Scared Haruni." The urqui are not mentioned. 

Haruni would not approve of Elemmacar telling such stories, grown up cousin or no, and she doesn't want another argument between her Haruni and her grandparents.

"Oh, darling." 

The Queen Mother sinks down onto the child's little bed and enfolds the tiny body into an embrace, shushing her gently. 

"It's alright sweetheart, it's nothing but the wind."

She shakes her head, scrunching her eyes closed. "Scared. It's too dark."

A soft sigh leaves Indis' lips, and she lifts the child onto her hip, pressing a kiss to the ruffled silver-gold waves.

"But it's late darling. Do you want to sleep with Haruni for now?"

Curling her little hands into the smooth silk of her grandmother's nightgown, Almárëa nods, not looking into the bright, impossibly blue eyes. 

With a little smile, balancing the tiny child on one hip and carrying the lamp with her other hand, Indis makes her way back to her room, lying down with the small, warm body curled against her as she dims the lamp. 

Almárëa relaxes as she closes her eyes again, clinging to Haruni as she tries to wipe away the nightmare from her mind. 

Her voice sounds amused, but her calloused hand is soft as it curls around her granddaughter. 

"There is nothing out there, sweetheart, and if there was, we will always protect you. There is nothing for you to fear darling, nothing at all."

Almárëa sleeps again, curled up against her grandmother. 

The Queen Mother lies quite still, staring up at the canopy of the bed, eyes blank and anguished. It is twenty-nine löa to the 'day' since her husband died. 

Even with her granddaughter sleeping kittenlike near her, she feels so dreadfully alone. 

****************

Almárëa blinks and yawns. 

"Haruni? Is it time to get up?"

Someone's lit a lamp, but not the usual blue ones. The light is silver and very pretty, like the stars got brighter.

It should be time to get up if there's a light, but she still feels so tired. 

"Haruni?"

"Just a moment, sweetling." Haruni sounds distracted, so Almárëa sits up, and looks straight out of the window.

The first thing she notices is that the light is shining in through the window. 

It's big and round, and it's just hanging in the sky. No one is holding it, but she can just make out what looks like a person inside it. 

Haruni is staring, her eyes wide. "They did it, glory to the One, they did it."

"What? What did they do Haruni?"

Startled, Indis jumps, and then gathers the little body up. "Here, let us go out into the city, and then we can see better, no?" 

As she dresses the two of them, Haruni spins a marvellous tale, about the labours of the Ainur to create from the ruins of the Trees, a new, beautiful light. 

The last flower and fruit, set into vessels and guided by two chosen Maiar, eternally crossing the heavens as the Trees had waxed and waned. 

For Almárëa's entire life, this great task has occupied them, and finally it is near to completion. 

She has spent her whole life in a twilight world lit by fires and lamps. 

And now, light, true light has returned. 

Haruni leads them down and out, into the great square at Tírion's centre.

The city is alive, great and small alike flooding into the streets to stare in awe and wonder at the light. It is beautiful, and many begin to weep, for wonder and for renewed grief at the loss of the tree of silver. 

Wind still whips through the streets, but no one notices now, to enraptured with the shining orb hanging in the sky.

Almárëa can only stare and marvel, lifting her hands to the silver light and laughing.