No Returning by StarSpray

Chapter 1

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Ingwë found Finwë and Elwë beside the waters, busy with fishing nets. Elwë's long fingers moved ceaselessly to twine and braid together reeds and grasses into ropes, and Finwë's brow was pinched in concentration as he carefully knotted those ropes together to make a net, though their work stopped neither from talking and laughing together.

"Hello, Ingwë!" Elwë called when he spotted Ingwë approaching along the shore. "How did the hunt go?"

"Very well," said Ingwë once he was close enough to not have to shout. He crouched down beside Finwë. "How goes the fishing?"

"My nets broke," said Elwë cheerfully. "My own fault. But Finwë knows some clever knots that he swears will not unravel."

"I'm surprised your old net lasted as long as it did," said Finwë. "I hope you make rope better than you tie it." Elwë shoved him; Finwë shoved back, and Elwë went toppling into the water with a great splash. Ingwë ducked behind Finwë, laughing, as Elwë surfaced, coughing and spluttering.

Elwë crawled out of the water but abandoned his rope-making in favor of trying to get the clumps of mud out of his hair. Ingwë moved to sit behind him and help. "If you are done bickering," he said as he flung bits of dark mud away, "I have news."

"What is it?" Finwë asked without looking up from his renewed efforts at net-making.

"Oromë has returned," Ingwë said. "He brings word from the rest of the Valar."

"What word?" asked Elwë.

"They want us to leave here and go to their lands in the West. It is safer there, Oromë says, and the Valar have much to teach us. But no one can agree on whether we should go or not."

"If all the Quendi could agree on something we would not be Quendi," said Finwë. "I can tell you that if you find five of the Tatyar to say one thing you'll find at least six to say the opposite."

"And six more to say something else entirely," added Elwë. "It is the same among the Nelyar. Can one pity someone like Oromë? The thought of trying to unite all of the Quendi to something like leaving makes me shudder."

"There is talk of choosing just a few to go, to see whether this place in the West is all that Oromë says," said Ingwë. "But when I left they were arguing about that, too."

Finwë looked at Elwë, and then at Ingwë. "What if we volunteered?" he asked. "I'm not afraid—and I want to see these Trees that Oromë keeps telling us about."

"I would also like to see this place," said Elwë. Ingwë could easily imagine his thinking—his brother had lost two children to the shadowy monsters that hunted them before Oromë had first come.

"Well," said Ingwë, "I cannot let you two go alone, or you'll get into worse trouble than falling in a lake." As they had been speaking his fingers had been busy, plaiting Elwë's hair into one long silver plait down his back. Now he tied it off and sat back on his heels. And he wanted to see this place, too. The thought of a place full of light, where they could go where they wanted and live their lives without fearing what haunted the shadows beyond their fires—he wanted very much to take his people to such a place. And Oromë had already taught them a great deal. What else might they learn from his brethren?

"Then it's settled!" Finwë said. He set aside the net and got to his feet. Ingwë rose, and they both hauled Elwë to his feet; he laughed and slung an arm around each of their shoulders. He towered over them both, and was still dripping water, so that Ingwë was soon nearly as wet as Finwë, as they made their way back to the place where Oromë camped. Even if they did not find that Valinor was all that Oromë said, Ingwë thought, they would still have done something amazing—gone farther than any Quendi had ever dared to go before. But something told him it would be all that was promised, and this was just the beginning of something amazing.

.

"There it is!" Finwë cried, leaping to his feet and pointing to the horizon. Just visible, a dark spot in the starlight on the water, the shape of the isle could be seen, growing slowly larger. At last, the Nelyar were coming—the Teleri, some were calling them, because they had tarried so long on the Journey and then at its end. Ingwë had been in Valinor already when he heard that Elwë had disappeared in the forest. That had been the worst part of waiting—knowing that there was nothing he could do to help search for him. Even Finwë had not been able to stay behind to help, having had to keep his own people together.

But now there would be no more waiting and worrying. Elwë would step off of the island and laugh at them for it.

Of course, it took some time for the island to make its way all the way to the Bay of Eldamar. And there it stopped. Ulmo rose out of the waters to wave in greeting to Ingwë and Finwë before sinking back beneath the waves. Farther out in the distance Ingwë could hear Uinen singing. Overhead the stars shone; behind them the golden light of Laurelin streamed through the Calacirya. Ingwë waded out into the water as the first boat came in to land. To his surprise, it was Olwë who first stepped out onto the shore, not Elwë. "Olwë!" Finwë embraced him. "You have come at last! But where is Singollo? What keeps him on the isle? I would have thought he'd swim ahead if the boats were not fast enough!"

Olwë had smiled upon seeing them, but now it faded away. "Elwë is not here," he said. In the light that spilled over the hills behind Ingwë, Olwë's hair was white as starlight. But there were dark circles underneath his pale blue eyes, as though he had not slept in a very long time.

Ingwë felt a chill go down his spine. Olwë spoke those words the same way they had spoken of those lost in the forests near Cuiviénen, those whose bodies were never found. "What do you mean, he is not here?" he asked, through a throat suddenly tight, with breath that he could hardly spare, as breathing had become difficult.

"He must be here," said Finwë, in a strange, almost strangled sort of voice. "Elwë must be…"

But Olwë shook his head. "We searched and searched, but we could not wait any longer. Elmo stayed behind. And Nowë, and—many others. They refused to leave without him. But he is lost, and I—I promised him before we left home that if something happened I would see that the Journey was completed. And so I did."

In tears, Finwë embraced Olwë again. Ingwë closed his eyes, bowed his head. Never in all of his imaginings—good and bad—had he thought that only two out of their three would return to Valinor. It had seemed impossible. And yet…

He raised his head and looked towards the east. It still felt wrong, but he knew that the best they could hope for was that Elwë was dead, and that his spirit was in Mandos, and that he would join them someday. But that did not feel like a comforting thought, here with the water cold lapping against his legs and the stars still unfamiliar overhead, the grief new and raw as an open wound. Even Laurelin seemed to have dimmed.

.

As Nienna began her song of mourning for Laurelin and Telperion, the clatter of hooves broke the silence that had fallen over the rest of them. It was so dark that Ingwë could not tell at first who spoke—it was as though the darkness itself had gained a voice, to tell them all where Melkor had gone after destroying the Trees. To tell them that Finwë King of the Noldor was dead—that he had been slain, the only one who had not fled before the horror of the Dark.

The news was like a physical blow, sending Ingwë to his knees. His first thought was—How did it all go so wrong? They had come to Valinor and seen its beauty and its peace and its Light, and they had gone back, the three of them, Ingwë, Finwë, Elwë, to convince their families and their people to follow Oromë into the West, that it would be a long journey and hard but it would be worth it. And now—

His second thought was for his sister. Indis had not come to this would-be reconciliation, fearful that her presence would only upset Fëanáro. Ingwë could only hope that she was not alone, that her ladies were with her, and her daughters.

His third thought was for Fëanáro, who had risen up in rage and grief and cursed Melkor and Manwë both, one for murdering his father and the other for calling Fëanáro away from him. Ingwë got to his feet, but when he called out to Fëanáro his voice fell flat and dull in this strange darkness, but even if he had heard, Fëanáro would not have heeded him, for he turned and fled, and no one dared to go after him. As torches and lamps were lit around him, old fears welled up in Ingwë, that he had not thought of since the end of the Great Journey. It was dangerous to stray too far and alone outside of the light of the fires. It was a warning Ingwë had never had to give to his children, nor Finwë to his. Maybe they should have. Maybe they should not have forgotten for themselves.

Chaos erupted in the wake of the Trees' death, of Finwë's death. The Noldor broke and reunited and marched forth—and broke again. Blood spilled on the quays of Alqualondë and stained the pearls and the diamonds on the beach. No bells rang in Valmar.

Ingwë heard what happened, and he wept, because neither Elwë nor Finwë were there to. He wept and he remembered when they three had sat together beside the waters of Cuiviénen, making a fishing net and talking of the future, Elwë with mud in his hair and Finwë with bits of grass stuck to his clothes, and the stars bright above their heads.

But to Cuiviénen there was no returning.