Thirty Day Character Challenge: Feanor by eris_of_imladris

Prompt 9

Prompt 9: Weak Points, Part One. Think about at least three shortcomings of your character - things they are bad at, mistakes they make, bad habits… Write a scene in which their failings play a pivotal role.

** A/N: This fic takes place in the AU where Amrod perishes on the boats burned at Losgar after the First Kinslaying.

“Where is Amrod?” Fëanor asked, and he began to gather his children together. There was Nelyo, yes, he was still warm even though the pat on his back felt forced and the look on his face was far more hardened than it should have been towards his own father. Kano looked shell-shocked, as if he was still trying to absorb all that had happened.

“Where is Amrod?” he asked him, and Kano replied that he did not know, that he had not seen him since the ending of the battle not long ago. But he had seen Amras – he was able to tell the twins apart easily – and he pointed and his father ran, his footsteps getting more desperate as he only saw a single redhead standing by the bay, watching the water.

“Where is Amrod?” he asked, and Amras’s mouth moved silently, not a word allowed to escape.

“Where is Amrod?” he asked again, and the boy, his sixth son, stayed silent still, simply looking out into the distance. He had seen him after the battle, he knew he had survived, it had not been his fate to die. He himself had helped Amrod onto the boats, his feet shaky, not feeling well at the churning of the waves. Had he embraced him then? He wondered, and his heart nearly leaped out of his chest when he saw another redhead approaching, only to be disappointed for the first time in his life to see his son Nelyo, his other brothers at his heels. One two three four five six, and Amras lifted his hand shakily.

“Where is Amrod?!” Fëanor screamed, and finally, he saw where Amras’s hand was pointing, out to the ships that he himself had given the command to set ablaze, to spite the Teleri and to prevent his half-brother Fingolfin and his followers from ruining his plans for Middle-Earth.

“He was going back to Amil,” Amras said, and Fëanor watched as the mast fell off the boat, shaking it and sinking into the dark sea. “He was just trying to help,” Amras said, and Fëanor watched the remnants of the boat bob violently in the waves.

His sons could swim. Why did he not see red hair in the water, moving towards him to scold or berate or never speak to him again, but at least to not die with his blood on his hands? The thought filled Fëanor’s heart with fear as he remembered the little boy he had been, and the premonition of Nerdanel, and the way she likely already knew her youngest son’s boat was taking water, being consumed by his father’s fire at last.

In a flash, he remembered Amrod as an infant, a shock of red hair in such a small baby, next to his twin. Even then, Nerdanel had held him tighter, even though she was more tired from this birth than she had ever been before, and he panicked just as he had when Nelyo was born. She had traced a finger over his face, as if she was trying to memorize his little features, and a deep panic had sunk into Fëanor’s heart when she named him Umbarto, fated. He pretended to misunderstand her, but both of them knew he had heard properly, and was simply trying to protect his little son from whatever the world would throw at him.

But this was not the world. This was Fëanor himself who had given the order when he had seen the boats in the distance, returning to bring Fingolfin and the rest of the Noldor over. He had set the flame and nocked the arrow, and although his blade had stolen the lives of many eldar that day, he felt a deep pang of sorrow, and he yearned to do a hundred things at once, chief among them diving into the freezing water and swimming faster than he ever had in his life, even if all he could do was hold his son’s frigid body as the fëa separated from the hroa in a painful way that he absolutely did not deserve.

He could not speak, did not dare to even try. He watched as the boat took more water, and he did not need any more confirmation as Amras fell to his knees like a puppet whose string had been cut. He knew if it was him, he would have been lashing out in fiery anger, but his now-youngest child of his now-six children just seemed to melt, deflating like nothing was left.

He knew Amras would not want a hand around his shoulder, or certainly, not his. Nelyo still looked over at the horizon, watching the remnants of the boat as the others started to fall into the water with great resounding crashes. He stood silently, even though the men looked to him for guidance, even though everything had been destroyed, for now his son was dead at his own hand, and all he could see was the little red head in his hands, the sweet smile on Nerdanel’s face, their joking and playing and hunting and everything he had ever done.

Steeling his heart, he knew he had to go forward. He tried to convince himself that Amrod had been in the wrong, that he had tried to run from battle, but in his deepest heart he knew there was no one who he could blame save for himself, and he knew he had lost two sons on this day, if not more, as Amras’s surviving brothers surrounded him, one hand on his shoulder, a few running through his long red hair, arms encircling him in hugs and pulling the group of brothers, one shorter, close together, in an unbreakable unit.

He did not recognize the look in Amras’s eyes. He did not try to apologize, nor to take the blame, although it was his. He simply knew they had to go on, for his son had not died for them to stop everything. His son had died as a sacrifice to the journey, to ensure that their way would go smoothly, that his half-brother would not be there to swoop in after the Kinslaying and demand a birthright that was not his. He tried to fuel the fire in his heart, he tried to think of his Silmarils, but he had just traded one son for the beginning of a chance at them, and the fire that burned bright in him at all times felt dampened by the feeling of his dead son’s arms around him, waterlogged like the Teleri floating in the bay, buried improperly, following him and quenching his fire for life with what should have been a tender embrace.

Now, with the death of his youngest son by his own hand, he was a kinslayer. Now, he believed all that they said about him, but there was nothing else to do but charge forward.