From That Rubble by StarSpray  

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Twenty Six

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So few grains of happiness
measured against all the dark
and still the scales balance. 

The world asks of us
only the strength we have and we give it.
Then it asks more, and we give it.
- “The Weighing” by Jane Hirshfield 

 

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The triplets were born early in the morning on the coldest day so far that winter. Fëanor was roused from his bed in the middle of the night, only an hour after he actually went to sleep, by Celebrimbor, who handily avoided the book Fëanor threw at his head before realizing it wasn’t Lalwen who’d come bursting into his room—again—without knocking. 

Celebrimbor shared this story with his uncles, to general laughter, as soon as they reached the house and Rundamírë’s workroom, the largest room on that floor where everyone had gathered to wait. Everyone was wide awake and very tired at the same time, and just anxious enough that they were all eager to laugh at anything and everything. “What made you think it was Aunt Lalwen?” asked Amras as Amrod dissolved into laughter beside him. “Does she often come to wake you in the middle of the night?”

“Well, not usually in the middle of the night…”

“Do you not lock your door?” asked Maglor from his seat on the floor between Daeron and Elrond, sounding deeply amused. “It’s a very helpful practice when it comes to keeping interfering brothers out. Probably sisters too.”

“It’s really not,” said Maedhros gloomily. “Not when there are also windows.”

“Aunt Lalwen can pick locks,” Caranthir added. Everyone turned to look at him. “What?”

“Is that how you learned?” asked Amrod.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about—”

“Atya, can you invent a lock that can’t be picked?” Amras asked. 

“I suppose I could try,” said Fëanor as he bent down to pick up Náriel. “Hello, my love.”

“How long does it take for babies to be born?” she asked as she snuggled into his arms, yawning halfway through the question. 

“Depends on the babies,” said Fëanor. “Where’s Curvo?” 

“Ammë wanted him with her,” said Celebrimbor from the doorway, from which he could apparently hear something of what was going on down the hall. “I didn’t know my mother knew those words. Or that she knew Westron.”

“What words?” Calissë asked.

“Who wants to hear a story?” Maglor asked brightly before Celebrimbor had to think of an answer. Elrond coughed to hide a laugh. “I don’t think I told you about the time I met a hobbit who as a boy had been given some magic beans to plant, that grew so tall that he was able to climb the beanstalks all the way up into the sky to ask a boon of Tilion himself!”

Both Calissë and Náriel drifted off before too long, in spite of the excitement and Maglor’s never ending fount of increasingly ridiculous stories. Calissë curled up on Daeron’s lap, and Náriel remained nestled in Fëanor’s arms. He sat and listened to his sons speak quietly among themselves and with Rundamírë’s father, who had arrived with her mother and sister to wait restlessly with all the rest of them. No one was really worried; Celebrían was with Rundamírë as well as her mother and sister and Nerdanel, and the healer who had overseen all three of her other labors—a bit crowded, but everyone seemed to agree that extra hands would be wanted when the triplets were finally born. Elrond had come along just in case, but he did not seem to think he would be needed. 

Anxiety knotted in Fëanor’s stomach anyway, though it was not as bad as it had been when each of his own sons were born. The worst part was not being able to do anything but wait. 

Eventually, some time after the sun rose, he got restless enough that he carefully transfered Náriel to Amrod’s lap, and went to stretch his legs in the hallway. Rundamírë’s father Laucatinco was already there, chewing on his thumbnail and pacing. He was a skilled smith, though they had not run in the same circles until Fëanor’s son had begun courting his daughter, and they’d spoken very little since Fëanor’s return from Mandos.

“How long did your twins take?” Laucatinco asked after a few minutes. 

“Two days,” said Fëanor. Laucatinco turned to stare at him, aghast. “I am no healer, of course, but I do not think one can really compare.”

“No,” Laucatinco said a little ruefully, “I suppose not. Still…two days?”

“There were complications—and no one really know what to do with two babies. That isn’t the case now, especially since Celebrían has borne twins of her own.”

The noise coming from the bedroom down the hall suddenly changed—someone exclaimed, and then a sharp wail pierced through the door. Fëanor looked at Laucatinco, who grinned back at him, elated and relieved in equal measure. 

It took far less time than Fëanor had expected to hear the next two cries. He remembered very well the bustle and slightly frantic chaos of Ambarussa’s birth, and imagined something similar was happening. When Nerdanel and Curufin emerged with the triplets in their arms, however, they were both smiling. 

Two more girls, and a boy, already given their mother-names: Nityanandë, Poicórë, and Nasartinco. Fëanor got to hold each of them very briefly before they were passed around to their numerous uncles and their siblings, and Laucatinco excused himself to go see Rundamírë. He helped Náriel settle Poicórë in her arms, and once Maedhros moved to take over, he went to embrace Curufin. “Was it as bad as you feared?” he asked. 

“No. I knew it wouldn’t be, I just—”

“I know, Curvo.” Fëanor kissed the top of his head as Curufin turned to hide his face in his chest for a moment. “You handled your worries far better than I ever did when all of you were born.”

Rundamírë’s sister came to fetch Curufin and the children after a very short while, after everyone had had the chance to hold and greet all three infants, and soon afterward Fëanor took his own leave. He’d been staying up late working the last week or so, and was feeling the effects—even the excitement of three new grandchildren wouldn’t be enough to keep him upright much longer. 

But instead of being able to go straight to bed, he was ambushed by both Findis and Lalwen, accompanied by Anairë and Gilheneth. “Well? How are they? Have they been born yet? Is Rundamírë well?”

“They have been born—two girls and a boy—and everyone is fine,” said Fëanor, finding himself herded in spite of his protests to breakfast with them, where Fingolfin was waiting alongside Fingon and Gil-galad. “I’m sure you’ll hear from one or another of my sons when Rundamírë is ready for visitors.” 

The excitement spread throughout Tirion—not only had the royal family grown by three, but they were the first triplets born in Aman, and leading up to Midwinter Day Fëanor was continually being stopped and congratulated, with messages of the same given to him to be passed on to Curufin and Rundamírë. 

He saw Elrond and Celebrían most days, since they were in Tirion for the holiday. They would return home afterward to make their own preparations for the feast next summer, and return in the spring to travel with the rest of the Noldor and the House of Finwë to the western plains where the feast was to be held. 

“Thank you for the book,” Fëanor finally got a chance to say to Elrond, a week after the triplets were born when they happened to meet in the palace library. “It’s beautifully made.”

“Thank you,” Elrond said, smiling. “High praise indeed from the maker of the tengwar. I think even now we can all use a reminder sometimes of the importance of hope—and occasionally a little bit of plain hobbit sense. Have you spoken to Maedhros since he returned to Tirion?”

“A little. Not about anything really important—but I am content to wait until he is ready. I was going to wait, before—it was Huan who had other ideas.”

“It’s for the best that it came out when it did, I think,” said Elrond. “At least this time we can be reasonably certain that Huan had not been conspiring with Gandalf.”

“Mithrandir has taken a rather surprising interest in my family,” Fëanor remarked as he pulled a book off of a shelf. 

“He has been very fond of Maglor for years—and I know that he wishes he had been able to make a more thorough search when he entered into Dol Guldur.”

Fëanor thought about mentioning what he had seen in the palantír, but decided against it. Elrond obviously carried a great deal of guilt himself over it already, needlessly, and there was no reason to add to it. It wasn’t anyone’s fault that Gandalf had not known who was in that cell, or that he had been unable to do anything to help.

“He also,” Elrond added after a moment, “tends to get bored. Middle-earth was—well, it was rather more exciting than Valinor is, these days. Most of us are quite content with the current state of affairs, but Gandalf is of the opinion that a little livening up never hurt anyone.”

“I can think of at least five hobbits who would disagree.”

Elrond grinned. “Maybe. Fortunately for us there are no dragons here that need slaying.”

A little later, Celebrimbor came with Calissë and Náriel to visit. Fëanor had given in to some pointed hints that Fingolfin had been dropping about people who overworked themselves and closed up his workshop as the Midwinter holiday approached, and was instead curled up by his hearth with a book. “Hello, loves,” he said, setting it aside as Calissë and Náriel ran to climb onto his lap. “How is everyone?”

“Ammë says the babies are doing well, but I don’t know how you can tell, because they just cry and sleep a lot,” said Calissë. “But we thought Grandmother Míriel was supposed to come visit, and she hasn’t.”

“She hasn’t?” Fëanor looked up at Celebrimbor, who sat in the chair across from him. “Has she written?”

“No. We hoped you would have heard from her.”

“Not since late summer. But she was very busy then—maybe she has delayed her coming until the holiday.” Even as he said it, though, Fëanor wasn’t sure he believed it. Míriel had arrived within days of both Calissë and Náriel’s births, delighted to be present and able to welcome her great-granddaughters into the world as she had not been able to welcome her grandsons or Celebrimbor. If she was unable to come for whatever reason, he would have expected her to at least send a letter to apologize.

Of course, he would have expected her to take more care of Maglor when asking him to write a song—so maybe he didn’t really understand his mother as well as he had thought. 

“Maybe,” said Celebrimbor, clearly as doubtful as Fëanor felt himself.

There were parades and performances most days throughout the city as the holiday neared. Fëanor went out that afternoon to watch one with Celebrimbor and his sisters, and they found Nerdanel there with her brother Linquendil and her sister Vanilómë. They greeted Fëanor politely and the children warmly, and after a little while Fëanor found himself walking with Nerdanel as they passed through a busy street market. “Do you correspond with my mother?” he asked her. 

“Sometimes,” said Nerdanel. “I have not heard from her in some months, however—I had thought I would see her this winter.”

“So did I.”

“You haven't heard from her either?”

“No. I sent a letter this morning. How is Curvo?”

“Disappointed. He was rather counting on her coming to visit, as she had before—but having all of his brothers here has made up for it a little, especially Maitimo, Macalaurë, and Tyelkormo.”

“Do you know why Tyelko was not here when the girls were born?” Fëanor asked. All he really knew was that Celegorm had disappeared into the wild a few years after Maglor and Maedhros had departed for Lórien, and returned only a couple of years before they did.

“He was with Nienna,” said Nerdanel. 

“With Nienna? Tyelko?”

“If I have learned anything, since they’ve all come back,” Nerdanel said after a slight pause in which they had to dodge around a group of children chasing each other down the street, “it is that Mandos does not heal all wounds. Nienna herself told me once that there are many things that can only be healed in life, because we Eldar were never meant to remain in death.”

There were a few things Fëanor wanted to say about that, but he bit his tongue. “Did she help him?” he asked instead.

“Yes. More importantly, she gave him the tools to help himself. Have you spoken to Nienna?”

“In the Halls.” It wasn’t really avoidable—to speak to Nienna or to Námo. “Once, since, but not for long.”

“Did you listen?”

“There wasn’t much of a choice, in Mandos,” Fëanor said. 

“And outside of Mandos?”

“Yes, I listened.” 

“Did the Valar speak to you when you went to the Máhanaxar?”

“None of them spoke at all but Manwë, and only to greet and then dismiss us.” Fëanor paused. “He also praised the singing, and welcomed Macalaurë home.”

“As he should,” Nerdanel said, a little stiffly. They had argued fiercely, once, over her loyalty to the Valar and his growing distrust. Now Fëanor thought their feelings might be more aligned than they had ever been before—he himself couldn’t muster anything stronger these days than ambivalence. “Do you know if Míriel has written to Macalaurë?”

“He said she had, not long after we returned to Tirion, though I don’t think she has since. But I am more concerned about Curvo at the moment.” He would never admit it, but Fëanor knew Míriel’s absence hurt him, and her silence even more. 

“He’s too tired and busy to be dwelling on it much,” said Nerdanel. 

“Grandmother, look!” Calissë ran back, waving something that Linquendil had just got for her. Náriel came running at her heels, and Fëanor scooped her up to kiss her cold-pinked cheeks, and all serious conversation was set aside. 

Midwinter came and went with all the usual celebrations. Maedhros came to the banquet, decked out in gems and silks that Fëanor was almost certain came from Finrod, since Maedhros was like Maglor these days and mostly eschewed finery—and mostly avoided Fingolfin’s court. He seemed far happier than Fëanor had yet seen him—laughing with his cousins, and dancing with his aunts and with Celebrían and Gilheneth, a glimpse of Prince Maitimo of old emerging for a few hours that evening. Fëanor left the dancing at the palace early, arriving at the much cozier gathering at Curufin’s home just before Calissë and Náriel were sent to bed, and was able to hear Daeron and Maglor sing quietly together into the night—including the song Daeron had said was his favorite, of the promise of winter’s long chill eventually giving way to warm sunshine and spring flowers.

Maedhros, Maglor, and Caranthir left Tirion a week later to spend the rest of the winter at Nerdanel’s house, accompanied by Lisgalen and Daeron. It was very quiet in the city, with everything ready for the coming summer. It snowed not long after his sons left, and Fëanor spent a few enjoyable afternoons throwing snowballs with Náriel and Calissë, getting them out of the house and their parents’ hair. Then the weather got bad enough that even Calissë did not want to venture outside, and Fëanor retreated to the library where he finally managed to cross some books off of his ever growing list, before adding a dozen more onto it. 

Then, finally, after everything had calmed down after the holiday, Nerdanel turned up in his rooms late in the morning. “What happened to you?” she asked as she came in without knocking, finding him sprawled out in front of the fire with a lump on his head and a scrape down the side of his face. 

“Calissë came home from Thingol’s realm with ideas,” Fëanor said without even attempting to get up. 

“Is Calissë all right?”

“Oh, she’s fine. Tyelpë and I just failed to take into account our heights when deciding where to aim the sleds. He’s fine too—I went first and discovered the miscalculation.”

“I see.” Nerdanel stepped over a few of the sketchbooks he had been paging through to reach the sofa. “Findis tells me that you’d like for me to come shout at you and get it all over with.”

They had, more or less, been getting along as agreed—like old acquaintances who just so happened to share children. Fëanor could not say he was happy to continue to ignore the past, because it was the sort of thing that would not let itself be ignored forever, but nothing good ever happened when he tried to force an issue, so he’d been leaving it up to Nerdanel and trying to ignore the occasional thoughtful looks she had been giving him when she thought he wouldn’t notice.

Of course she’d pick the day he’d knocked his head into a tree. 

“Can you shout at me without raising your voice, if you’re going to do it now?” he asked. 

Her lips twitched. “That’s not how shouting works. Do you often talk of me with your sister?”

“No.”

“Do you really go to Formenos every spring?”

“Not every spring, no.”

“Did you really show Telperinquar how to make silima?”

“Yes.”

“After you burned all of your notes, fearing someone else would find them—”

“That was a very long time ago, Nerdanel,” Fëanor sighed. “And it’s not like Tyelpë and Lómion are going to make Silmarils. They’re trying to find a way to catch lightning in a gem, and they need something that won’t be destroyed in the process.”

“Yes, I know. The worst part is that it isn’t nearly the most dangerous thing he’s ever done.”

“He is aware. And Curvo’s helping them.”

Silence fell, broken only by the crackling of the fire. Fëanor glanced at it and then hauled himself up to grab another piece of wood. As he watched the sparks swirl up toward the chimney Nerdanel said, “I felt it when you died. Did you know?”

He froze. The flames licked at the wood, and he remembered, suddenly and more viscerally than he had since his first coming to Mandos the flames that had killed him. “I didn’t,” he said finally. 

“I didn’t understand what was happening at first.” Nerdanel’s voice was distant, almost dreamy, not unlike Maglor’s when he spoke of his own painful past. “First I smelled burning hair, and then burning flesh—and then I felt something hot wrapping around all my limbs until I couldn’t move. The pain was horrible, though of course it wasn’t mine—I was not hurt. I think I frightened my parents very badly. And it lasted such a long time. I went to stay with Indis for some years afterward.”

Because Indis would have understood, Fëanor thought, feeling vaguely ill. She would have felt Finwë die as Nerdanel had felt him. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“I felt every one of our sons die, too—but that was just…an awareness. The only hurt was the grief. You were so different.”

He turned away from the hearth to look at her, and found her also staring at the fire, gaze far away, rubbing her arms—where the balrogs’ whips had wrapped around his, cutting into the flesh and burning it away at the same time. “I didn’t know,” he said. 

“Would you have acted as you did if you had known what it would do to me?”

“Do you really want me to answer that?” 

Her gaze sharpened as she looked at him, again fully present. “I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t.”

“I don’t think there was anything in the world that could have changed the course I had set myself on then,” Fëanor said. “I did not go to Middle-earth intending to seek death—if I expected to find it, it was not at the hands of balrogs.”

“No, you would have rather died as Nolofinwë did.”

“If I had to, yes.”

“And I would have felt that too.” Nerdanel looked away again. “I understand your grief for your father—I do. And I understand that you were under pressures none of us understood even before then—but you broke my heart, Fëanáro, and then you died, and I still don’t know how to forgive it. I did come here today to have it out with you, but now that I’m here I realize I’m not as angry anymore as I thought I was. I don’t know what it is that I feel. There might not be words for it. Some days I wish I had never loved you—except if I hadn’t, our children would not be, and I can’t wish them never born, in spite of everything.”

“Is there anything I can do?” Fëanor asked after a moment. 

“No.” Nerdanel rose. “Thank you for letting me read those letters.” It was Fëanor’s turn to look away. “I didn’t know you were still so unhappy.”

“I’m not. I wrote most of them years ago,” he said, keeping his gaze on the hearth. He felt the heat of the fire and it just made him think of the balrogs. His cheeks stung and his head ached a little from the morning’s exploits, but the memory of other worse pains was laid over it. He felt Nerdanel’s gaze on him for a moment more, and then she left, the door clicking shut quietly behind her. Fëanor exhaled as soon as he was alone, and covered his face with his hand. Every time he thought he had learned the worst of the consequences of his actions, something else arose. That even at such a distance he had managed to hurt Nerdanel so badly—he didn’t know what to do with it. 

Everyone liked to remark upon how Fëanor’s temperament had changed in Mandos—how surprising it was that he was so much quieter and calmer, that he did not get angry as he once had. They liked to forget that for much of his first life he had not been angry either—he had been passionate and unwilling to back down from an argument, but that was not the same thing. For such a long time his resentments had been quiet things, only simmering in the depths of his heart and easily forgotten. His temper would flare but it would fade just as fast. He could not say that he had ever been purely happy, for there was always grief shadowing him in the shape of his mother’s absence, but for such a long time he had not let it rule him—or he had not thought that he let it, not realized the ways in which it shaped every choice he made. Then, when he had gotten angry, had fallen down that well of fire and fury—well, that had overshadowed everything else, and he supposed everyone could be forgiven for forgetting that that all-consuming rage had not been there all along.

And for the most part he was content to let them think it was so—that he had left it all behind in death. Only Caranthir had hit upon the truth, albeit incidentally—that he was still angry—and Fëanor had only admitted to it because he hadn’t wanted Caranthir to think that he or any of his brothers were the object of it. 

Of course they weren’t. They didn't deserve it—they never had. 

He did, though.

For a while he sat and stared at the flames. Then the need to hit something grew overwhelming, and he got up to make his way to his forge, where he had a hammer and plenty of iron. Nails were easy—he just had to hit the metal until it formed a point, and move on to the next one. No thinking, just heat and noise and movement, while his mind circled around all the things he’d gotten wrong and couldn’t change, and the knowledge that there wasn’t anything anyone could have said to him in the past that would have made any difference. 

He lost track of time until a blast of cold air cut through the heat from the forge. Fëanor lowered his arm, and then realized he wasn’t going to be able to lift it again. He dropped the hammer onto the anvil. “You missed lunch and dinner,” Fingolfin said. 

“Sorry.”

“What happened?” Fingolfin’s head tilted as he frowned. “What happened to your face?”

“Sledding accident.” Fëanor wiped the sweat from his face, the scabbed-over scrapes stinging with it. He dropped the last nail into the box with the rest and turned to put out the forge fire. “Everyone’s fine.”

“So what has you so upset?”

“Who says I’m upset?”

“You.” Fingolfin crossed the room to pick up one of the nails. “You only ever make these when you just want to hit things.” 

Fëanor hadn’t realized he’d made it enough of a habit that it would be noticed. He didn’t answer, just focused on ignoring his aching muscles as he cleaned up. Fingolfin waited. Finally, Fëanor asked him, “Did Anairë feel it when you died?”

“Ah,” Fingolfin sighed. Then, “Yes. Didn’t you know…?”

“No. I didn’t.”

“No, you wouldn’t have—you weren’t there to see my mother after…after.” Fingolfin dropped the nail back into the box and walked around the anvil to pull Fëanor into his arms. “I’m sorry. What Nerdanel felt, though—it was only an echo.”

“That doesn’t really make it better.” He dropped his head onto his brother’s shoulder and closed his eyes. He felt dizzy and exhausted, and his head still hurt, and that morning sledding with Calissë and Náriel and Celebrimbor felt so very far away—like it happened to someone else. “When do the echoes stop?” he whispered. 

“I don’t think they ever do. We just have to learn how to live with them.”