Butterfly Wings by StarSpray

In the many gardens of Tirion there bloomed thousands of flowers, of all colors of the rainbow and more. And fluttering to and fro between the flowers and the trees and the shrubs were butterflies, little jewel-winged creatures that lived on sweet nectar and did little else, as far as Míriel could tell, except to show off their wings for the delight of the Elves and the Ainur. She spent hours sitting among the red roses and the pink and purple hyacinths and the golden laburnums with her sketchbook, carefully painting in painstaking detail not only the flowers but the butterflies too, in her mind already thinking of the dyes she could use to recreate them all in silks and cottons and wools—and gold and silver and copper, too. Finwë joined her and sang songs that Vána had taught him to bring butterflies by the dozens to land on the flowers around them and on his arms and in his hair, where they might sit patiently so Míriel could look as closely as she liked, though when she laughed at the sight of him, as she always did, they rose up like a brilliant cloud to scatter in the breeze, fluttering away to find other flowers in other gardens, leaving behind a light dusting of pollen on his sleeves and in his dark hair.

"What are you planning?" he asked, leaning over to peer down at a sketch Míriel had scribbled onto an empty page, a rough sketch of a gown with wide sleeves, much wider than was the fashion in Tirion. "Are you going to turn yourself into a butterfly?"

Míriel laughed. "Just wait and see." And she kissed him on his pollen-dusted lips and disappeared with a soft rustle of silk back into her workshop.

Princess Indis swept into the bright ballroom to gasps of delight and amazement, for it seemed at first that she was clad in living flowers and butterflies that fluttered their wings and rose into a cloud about her when she turned or twirled. But upon closer inspection one could see that the flowers were of the finest, lightest silk and the butterflies flapping wings were tricks of clever stitching and jeweled threads of every color under the sun. She laughed as she spun, nimble as Nessa and sparkling like Varda's stars, across the dance floor.
Míriel stood by and watched, very pleased to see the gown at last in motion. Finwë, in robes embroidered with malinornë leaves at the start of autumn, shimmering green and gold and silver, came to wrap his arms around her from behind. "You have outdone yourself, my love," he said into her ear, before pressing a kiss to her temple. "Your work will rival Vairë's own before too long."

"And those butterflies will not leave anyone covered in pollen," she replied, and he laughed. "Yet now that I see it, I realize I should have—"

"Oh, don't pick at it now! Dance with me instead!"