"As Fate" by hennethgalad

Chapter 1

"As Fate"

 The forest thinned, there were glades of wondrous flowers, strange and wild to eyes accustomed to the tended groves of Valmar. Beyond the scattered trees lay open meads of tall grasses rippling in the early wind. Telperion waned, far to the South, and they used the dimness to move forwards, the stealth learned at the feet of Oromë turned their light Elven steps to thistledown. The beast had taken refuge in a sprawling briar, its armoured hide untroubled by thorns. But as they waited in silence, the beast seemed to vanish. Nothing moved save the highest leaves on the oak and hazel overhead. Indis struggled to keep her breathing silent, it had always been her weakness, she would gasp with excitement and send the prey fleeing, while exasperated Elves rose from cover and emerged from behind trees to look at her with silent reproach. 

 But she had learned, she was silent now, and the great fanged creature was silent, hidden from their watchful eyes. They waited, and the sweat began to cool inside her fine mail armour, prickling against her skin, chafing at her neck. She had viewed it with disdain until the sight of the blood of a gored Elf, carried senseless before the slain beast that wounded him, had awoken her. 

 She flinched as Calinel laid a finger on her shoulder, and envied again the silence with which she moved. She turned her head and Calinel breathed into her ear

 'Can you see it ?'

Indis shook her head once, and frowned; the briar was still, the thick covering of leaves concealed all, there was nothing to see. But the subtle words of Oromë echoed in her mind: to look until you have seen, to look until you forgot why you were looking, to look until you become aware...

 With a start that she barely concealed from Calinel, she realized that she could see the beast, or rather, it was more that she could feel the glow of it, at bay, facing them, on the left of the oak. She raised a silent finger and pointed. Calinel tapped her shoulder in silent approval, and melted away.

 As they returned to the lodge, singing and laughing, Indis fell silent, considering the many kinds of skill, some seemingly gifts of Eru, others that could be learned and practiced, honed to approach the perfection that the Valar claimed unattainable, even for them, in the Marring. She herself could run, as they said, like Nessa, and none could catch her. But though she was pleased at the admiration, it felt unreal, for no effort of hers was at stake, their praise was not for her, but for Eru, while she herself had merely ran. Calinel, silver-haired Calinel, with eyes as silver as her hair, had grinned at her when she had asked how she moved so silently.

 'Well' Calinel had laughed, 'I shall explain my talent for stealth when you explain your talent for swiftness !'

As they entered the smoke-blue lodge, her drum flew through the air, thrown by a laughing flautist. She raised her eyebrows, caught the drum, turned it smoothly in her hands and tapped a simple rhythm. The flautist replied with a brief but complex melody, and Indis laughed. 

 'By the Valar, if you do not let me pause to wipe the mud from my face and the dust from my throat, I shall play on your head next time !' 

 The flautist had feigned fear, and cried 'Ho there ! A drink for the lady, and indeed, for me, for I too have an empty glass, though less need of hot water...'

 She had gestured with her drum as though to throw it at him, and he had flinched back, raising his hands in mock alarm, as a goblet of watered wine was offered her. She drank it swiftly, sighing with pleasure as the light, cool draught quenched her thirst, and the flautist turned to where a lute had sounded its first chord. The music rose behind her as she strode away to bathe, and the first lines of the chorus from 'The Awakening' echoed in the rafters of the old timber lodge. 

 She lay in the bath until the water was almost cold, warmed by the wine and the music she could still hear, gazing unseeing at the smoke-darkened ceiling. It was strange to be so far North, she did not enjoy the cold. No fires were needed in Valmar save stove and smelter, furnace and forge. There was a childrens rhyme about it... But here in the North, people in the lodge flocked like doves around any lit fire, and the merry crackle of burning logs seemed to sparkle glittering improvisations over their orderly music. She wondered if it were possible to capture the sound of the flame in the rhythm of her drum, to play along with the fire, to harmonise with the flame.

On their return to Valmar, the city was noisy with excitement at the news that Finwë and Míriel had received the gift of a child, and many guesses were made at a name. Ingwë himself awaited her in the Hall.

 'Will you travel with us, my dear ? We go to Tirion, to congratulate our beloved Finwë and the lady Míriel.'

 For the thousandth time she was relieved that she had given no sign of her love for Finwë, neither to him, nor to anyone. She could face Ingwë with steady eyes and a warm smile, and no blush on her pale cheek. 

 'I would be delighted ! I shall not keep you waiting long.'

But she knew, with a cold horror, that things were gravely amiss in the House of Finwë. She could see it in the eyes of one or two members of his household, and some of the servants, and she herself could see, or feel, the terrible imbalance between Míriel and her son. He, the sleeping innocent, lay in her arms, glowing, to the gifted eyes of Indis, like a furnace, while Míriel, smiling vaguely, seemed hollow and dim, insubstantial as mist, her skin clung to her bones and her eyelids, grey with pain.

 Indis thought of the tentacled creatures of the sea, whom, legend had it, starved themselves to death to guard their growing offspring.

 Indis had seen many Elves perish, far away, over ocean and mountain, over the landscape of time, but never, since coming to Aman, had she seen a spirit so very close to death. She gazed at Finwë in horror, but it was plain that he had seen nothing, and that none had told him, none of the few who could...

 His face glowed with joy, his eyes shone, proud tears ran across his smiling cheeks unheeded, he looked more beautiful than she had ever seen him, and her heart stabbed her with pain at the suffering he faced, when the truth of what Míriel had done became known to him. But Indis thought of gifts and talents, and wondered whether Míriel had chosen to pour her Light into the growing child, or if Eru had decreed that she be drained like a wine-cask for the shaping of her fiery son.