To Doubt and To Have Faith by Himring

Chapter 1

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Sometimes Inzilbeth wondered how Faithful she really was. It had been easier to be Faithful in the Andustar, she thought. Of course, she had become aware early on in childhood that her family’s beliefs were not universally shared and, later on, that the Faithful were a minority in Numenor and losing ground. She had been aware of the need for discretion, that it was prudent to keep one’s Faith a private matter and avoid raising the subject in public or in mixed company. But within her family’s household, Faith had been a given, and in the towns and villages of the Andustar the influence of the Lords of Andunie had somewhat curbed the tongues of those who were inclined towards the King’s Party. Those who refused to countenance the Faithful entirely usually left, for Armenelos or elsewhere.

She had felt secure in her Faith at home. To regard the Valar or the Elves with suspicion, to grumble about the Ban or the Gift, was as unthinkable as insulting her parents, was tantamount, in fact, to attacking her mother and the underlying principles of her mother’s teachings.

Armenelos, the capital city, felt as if it was in another country. They did things differently there. She had arrived believing she could get by merely by being even more discreet, as she had during shorter visits. However, during those visits she had still been shielded by the presence of older male relatives more than she had realized. She had failed to anticipate how having to live here—having to survive in an uneasy marriage with a husband and king who held diametrically opposing beliefs and was convinced he had every right to determine what went on in her head—would bruise her feelings, constantly. He never beat her—that was below his dignity—but she felt black and blue and sore inside.

She found herself adrift alone in the midst of a sea of Unfaith. The ladies who had accompanied her from the Andustar were quickly dismissed and sent home. She felt she had disappointed her uncle and her cousins who had clearly hoped that she could subtly influence Gimilzor to be less hostile to the Faithful. Instead, marrying her seemed to have rather had the opposite effect—but no, that could hardly be entirely due to her and the very limited resistance she was capable of!

Except that she could not fathom how she sometimes seemed to manage to provoke Gimilzor when she had not said a word, when she was not even aware of conveying silent criticism in any way. Just the suspicion that she was thinking independent thoughts, behind the blandest of facial expressions, sometimes seemed to be enough. She started putting on more make-up, all the protection she could afford herself.

If there were Faithful in Armenelos, they did not frequent the court and she would have drawn unwelcome attention to them by seeking them out too openly. She was surrounded by people who seemed very sure that the Valar and the Elves were conspiring to keep Numenor down, that the Ban had been imposed for the unworthiest of motives, and the Gift was a curse, an undeserved and cruel one. Some of them were prepared to argue their point very eloquently. She always listened attentively and politely, of course, as she had been trained to do.

They intimidated her. Increasingly, she was failing to keep up the argument with them even inside her head. She had been trained to maintain courteous small talk, not to wage dispute as if it were on a battle-field. The fiercest lectures left her thoughts shredded and her head empty except for a general feeling of wrongness.

Meanwhile, things were not going well in the Andustar. Then her father died in an unfortunate accident, kicked in the head by a panicked horse. She had not been there, barely made it in time for the funeral, was not permitted to stay away from court long enough to comfort her mother and be comforted by her in shared grief, although they spent an hour just sitting, hugging each other close. She could not pretend, even to herself, that she was grateful for that Gift, that she had confidence it was a good thing for her father to have gone wherever he had gone.

But in the end, she knew she did not need to be certain. She knew little of the Elves—for all that she had seen an elven ship from Eressea come to land, once, and those King’s Men who ranted about their distrust of Elves, for the most part, had not—and less of the Valar. She could not herself know their true reasons for the Ban or guess at Eru’s reasons for the Gift, merely hope that her ancestors had the right of it. But nevertheless, she discovered, she was still of the Faithful, precisely because she doubted. The King’s Party was dreadfully, terrifyingly certain. For all their rhetoric, she thought, they were only listening to their fears. And was it strength in a husband that could not brook even silent disagreement from his wife or was it a sign of weakness?

Inzilbeth held on to her doubts, tenaciously, as if they were the articles of her Faith. And when her first son was born, she lay on her knees before the cradle, soundlessly mouthing blessings in Quenya in his ears. Inziladun opened his eyes. It was an illusion surely—he was so very young, almost new-born—but he looked as if he knew somehow precisely what she had said. He was such a quiet, solemn baby!

Would her son listen to her, care what she had to say? Not if Gimilzor had anything to do with it! But she would try to make him hear, regardless.

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Chapter End Notes

Tagged for Ar-Gimilzor and Lindorie, but not Tar-Palantir, because they are "officially" rare characters on the SWG site (as per a challenge list), while Tar-Palantir is not.

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