With sword in hand by Morcondil

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With sword in hand

Her eldest brother gifts her a sword on her begetting day. Their mother is displeased, but dares not gainsay Findaráto, for already he is accounted wise among the Noldor.

“Take it and with my blessings, little Nerwen,” he says. “It might be overlarge yet, but you will grow. I will teach you to use it as more than mere decoration—none of us know our own doom.”

She takes the naked blade from her brother’s open hands, and her untrained arm falters beneath its weight. The hilt is inlaid with bright gems, and the polished steels shines, reflecting the light of the Trees and the shimmer of her own golden hair. Such a sword would not look amiss amongst the fine things on display in Arafinwë’s noble house.

But the edge of the blade is thin and deadly; it is not merely art. Nerwen has heard the rumors swirling in Tirion, rumors of Fëanáro plotting and scheming—she knows what prompted Findaráto’s gift. She yearns to run her finger along its steel, but its bite would be deep. Instead she raises her trembling sword-arm high above her head. The weapon glints craftily; Nerwen is almost certain she can hear it sing. Panting with exertion, she lowers the sword until the tip kisses the ground.

Nerwen smiles at her brother, a dazzling flash of teeth made potent by childish delight, but tempered by adult wisdom. “Thank you, Findaráto!” She laughs for joy, and he laughs with her.

Yet Findaráto’s answering laugh echoes also the grim determination that colors Nerwen’s own voice.

Nerwen’s friend Fárion, the goom’s assistant, is jealous. She feels his eyes on her as she practices each morning under Findárato’s keen gaze. After lessons are finished, he is sulky and reticent.

“If I had such a sword as you, I would be counted bravest among the Eldalië,” he boasts. “I would best you in a sparring match every time!”

Nerwen disagrees and tells him so. “Findaráto says I am become stronger and quicker than any boy my age,” she says. “It is I who would best you.”

Fárion’s cheeks redden and he is silent. She doesn’t notice, too caught up in the satisfaction of her own prowess with the sword.

The groom’s assistant continues to watch her practice, and now his gaze is resentful. Nerwen feels his eyes follow her body as she moves through exercises and drills, and as she spars with her brothers—once she even disarms Angaráto. And this is how it must always be: the daughter of the noble house of Arafinwë will always be scrutinized, and always there will be those who envy her.

So be it.

Nerwen points her chin proudly and wields her sword with iron-willed determination. Where at first she was clumsy, she now moves with grace.

“Again?” calls her brother when she is through with a complicated series of steps.

“Again,” she agrees.

Fárion does not speak to her again; some time later he marries a golden-haired maiden from Valimar and leaves Tirion. Nerwen mourns the loss of their friendship, but she does not mourn overlong.

She makes her mistake one day in Lórien’s gardens, where a group of her Telerin kin gather to make merry. A dozen adolescents from Alqualondë lounge below a stand of trees with casks of wine stolen from their parents’ cellars. Nerwen steals away from her mother and her ladies to join them. The Telerin youths are strangers, but welcome Nerwen as one of their own. She holds a goblet of summer-warm wine in hand and feels as if she belongs.

Such things are never meant to last for the daughter of Arafinwë.

In a fit of defiance, Nerwen had donned her sword-belt that morning, had insisted on wearing it to the gardens. Her brothers, like many Noldor, now go about their days armed; all are wary of Fëanáro and the things he said before his exile to Formenos. Yet such weapons are misplaced among the peaceful Sea-elves, and Nerwen’s companions soon observe the oddity. One, a tall boy with raven hair and an arrogant nose, stares boldly.

Nerwen lifts her own nose. She knows this boy—his father is a Noldo, a lesser craftsman. And she is Lady Artanis of the House of Finwë. She does not abide insolence.

“Do you know how to wield that blade, maiden?” he asks. “Or do you wear it only as a conversation piece?”

“I know how to wield it.” Nerwen draws her blade and hefts its weight in a calloused palm. It is rash, but she is young and likes not the intimate way the strange boy’s eyes caress her unbound hair. She levels her sword, mocking. What do you know? her face asks.

Another sword is produced from the band of youths. A circle is drawn in the dirt beneath the trees. Nerwen and the Telerin boy face off, weighing their weapons and bracing their feet.

“I will try not to hurt you,” she says. The youth and his friends from Alqualondë laugh.

“Begin!” calls one of the audience. Nerwen springs.

The match is over quickly. The boy falls to the dust as soon as Nerwen’s weapon strikes his. Noldorin though his father might be, this is a gentle youth from the seaside. He is a soft princeling of no great lineage, and Findaráto has taught his sister well. Nerwen stands over the fallen Teler, her eyes alight with satisfaction. Pleasure hums between her ribs as she watches the youth rise from the ground. He shakes the dust from his linen robes but not the embarrassment from his expression.

“I did not hurt you?” she asks, teasing.

The boy’s mouth hardens.

It is a short-lived victory.

Eärwen and her ladies approach. Too late, Nerwen realizes the folly in publicly shaming this proud youth. She sees that he sought only to assert himself before his friends—before the shining-haired stranger he had looked upon with amorous intent. Now it is Nerwen who prickles with shame as her mother’s reprimands rain upon her bowed head. A mistake; all a mistake.

She slips away from the crowd, deeper into the gardens, while furious tears flood her vision.

Her mother orders the sword put away when they return to Tirion. She had warned Findaráto that no good would come of forging and wearing such weapons. Whatever madness slumbers in Fëanáro’s heart, her children would not partake of it.

“You will weave garments to clothe your father and brothers,” says Eärwen. The raiment of the noble house of Arafinwë is intricate and subtle. Nerwen spends many days learning to spin, to weave, to sew. [1]

Her brother, Findaráto, returns her sword in secret. “Do not be foolish this time, sister,” he warns.

She is not foolish again. She has learned the price of childish bravado. Instead she practices in secret. In silent gardens and silent halls, she moves through familiar steps and figures. She remembers the taste of victory, sweet but swiftly gone.

In the daylight, in Eärwen’s weaving room, there is a new visitor: the Telerin boy with the arrogant nose. He clasps Nerwen’s hand and presses his lips to hers. When he kisses her, all she sees is him prone in the dirt, bested by her blade. She pushes him away.

“Do not visit again,” she tells him.

Kin-slain. Broken bodies fallen into the harbor. Torches shine red: blood-light.

A great cry arises. Those who remain mourn.

Nerwen stands, sword in hand, with Ñolofinwë’s host. Her brother is at her back. Alqualondë lies before them, rent asunder. And the ships are gone.

Many swords were raised; many lives claimed. All for naught. The ships are gone.

“We will prevail,” whispers Nerwen to the rotting night. She grips the hilt of her sword with confidence she cannot feel. It is too late to do anything else but prevail.

She bears her sword across the Helcaraxë, across the ice where the sharpened steel comforts her not.

She yearns to die.

In Doriath she fights alone, for the people of Elu Thingol do not think it meet that a woman should wield a blade. A strange people, these long-sundered kinfolk. During the days she sits with the lady Melian and her fair daughter, mastering the strange, silvery tongue of the Sindar. But during the nights she slips through shadowed groves to a cool glade beside a stream. Here she practices.

She practices with vigor, no longer an uncertain child but a woman grown to full stature and strength. She remembers her promise given to Findaráto to forswear foolishness, yet in this strange new land it is foolish to live unprepared.

Never again will Nerwen of the noble house of Arafinwë be weak.

While she fights in the twilit woods, she feels eyes upon her. There are watchers peering through vines and branches; mayhap they are sent by the lady Melian. She cares not. There is always someone watching Nerwen.

Let them see. Let them know what she is.

He emerges from the trees one breezeless night when the moon hangs low. A silver-haired lord with eyes watchful and wise. He wears a sword at his hip.

Nerwen stops mid-movement, arrested. She is not guilty; she has done nothing wrong. Yet she feels bare beneath this strange Sinda’s penetrating gaze. He speaks and she struggles to follow his words, spoken in that unfamiliar forest tongue.

“Do not be alarmed,” says the lord. “I am Celeborn, one of Thingol’s kin. I have watched you practice your bladework many a night.” He pauses. There is no change in Celeborn’s serene countenance, but his eyes seem to smile. “You are magnificent, daughter of Finarfin.”

Nerwen is silent. Too-present is the memory of the arrogant-nosed Teler.

This silver-bright lord is not deterred by silence. “I thought I might spar with you, lady. You see I come armed.” He draws his weapon, and she sees it is as finely wrought as her own. He is not a callow youth who challenges in jest or out of fragile pride.

Still she is silent.

Celeborn mistakes her reticence for fear. Or perhaps he only pretends to make the mistake. “I will not harm you, lady,” he says. “I swear it.” She is sure his eyes smile this time.

Now pride, her old enemy, is roused. Nerwen raises her sword and assumes the familiar stance her brother taught her an Age ago. Celeborn shifts to mirror her.

They begin.

At first she matches him effortlessly. Her muscles are warm and fluid. She is strong, and her arms absorb the impact of his blade without protest. Their feet move swift and sure across the grass.

They are bathed in the moon; their shadows dance across the glade.

But Celeborn is more cunning than she, and his endurance is without end. Nerwen sees that it is only a matter of time until his disarms her. She is overmatched.

The end comes all at once. She stands unarmed before her opponent’s raised sword. Breathless, she stares into his solemn face. He has seen neither Telperion nor Laurelin, but there is a fairness in his mien that stirs her as only the Trees once did. She is exhilarated as if the victory had been hers.

“I yield,” she says. The Sindarin words are rough on her tongue.

Celeborn makes no reply, but the glimmering smile in his eyes is unmistakeable. He lowers his blade. An animal rustles in the leaves overhead, and far off, a bird sings to welcome the gathering night.

Chapter End Notes

[1] Nerwen’s time spent weaving with her mother, and her relationship with domestic crafts, is explored in another one of my fics, There she weaves. (Link goes to AO3.)

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