Rest, relaxation, & other strange pursuits by Morcondil

Rest, relaxation & other strange pursuits

Read Rest, relaxation & other strange pursuits

There were two times of year Manwë hated most: Varda's yearly spring-cleaning frenzy and the Valier's annual Top Secret, Ultra-Exclusive, Ladies-Only (That Includes You, Irmo!) Camping Trip. But he was sure he hated the latter more. As annoying as it was to suffer through a solid week of his mate's harried scrubbing and her handmaids' outright rude comments about the state of his study (it was lived-in, thank you very much!), it was even more exasperating to have to endure a year's worth of sly inside jokes, raised eyebrows, and inexplicable giggles about some event he was forbidden from attending. It wasn't that Manwë opposed to the camping trip so much as to all the resultant fun the Valier all got from it weeks and months after the trip was well over.

Fun, by its very nature, was always suspicious.

And yet here he was, standing in the palace courtyard under a blistering hot sun, dutifully bidding the ladies farewell, and wishing he dared to forbid them from going in the first place. (He tried that once, and once had been enough.)

"Now dear," said Varda, fussing with his robe. "You won't starve yourself while I'm gone, will you? I've put up quite a few tasty meat pies in the larder, and if you run out of those, Queen Indis has promised to send up hot meals from Tirion, just have Eönwë fetch them for you."

Manwë rolled his eyes upward, toward Oiolossë. "I'm quite capable of feeding myself."

"Of course you are, dear," said Varda lightly. "I was just telling you about the pies to make myself feel better. You know how silly women can be about their husbands' health."

As he knew everything there was to know about the silliness of women, Manwë nodded. If it made Varda feel better, then by all means he would eat the pies.

"Varda!" called Yavanna from where she waited a few feet away with the rest of the Valier. All six of them were burdened by what appeared to be enough provisions to feed an entire Elven host. "Stop fussing so we can leave. I'll be thrice-damned if I have to wait another hour for b—"

"Shh!" hissed Nienna. Her teary, red-rimmed eyes darted toward Manwë.

Yavanna kept her mouth shut, but reached out to pinch Nienna’s upper arm in retaliation. Manwë looked at her with narrowed eyes. He’d always maintained that it just wasn’t proper for a passel of women to hie themselves off to the woods once a year and then refuse to speak about what they did there to their menfolk. But his brethren didn’t share his concern, which was most upsetting of all. If the King of all Arda told you there was something amiss, the correct thing to do was pay attention.

Manwë sighed and turned his attention back to his wife. “Are you quite sure this trip is necessary, Varda?” He made his best imitation of what Tulkas called his “puppy-dog eyes,” but it seemed that his wife, unlike Nessa, was immune.

“It simply wouldn’t do to break centuries of tradition now, my dear,” said Varda. “What would the Elves say if I were to be so inconsistent?”

Manwë shrugged. Elves be damned, who were they to question the doings of their betters?

“No,” continued Varda. “We’re going now, and we’ll be back before you know it. Don’t fret too much, my love! And don’t forget to change your robes at least once while we’re gone.”

With that, his spouse joined the rest of the Valier, picked up an enormous knapsack full of Eru-knew-what, and led the ladies out of the courtyard and down the mountain pass from Oiolossë.

It would have been well, and Manwë would have resentfully awaited his wife’s return without incident (as he always did), if only Vána hadn’t looked back just as she reached the gates, and winked at him.

Winked at him! The very nerve.

#

“Eönwë! Get in here, you drudgling!”

It took only a few moments for Manwë’s dour second-in-command to arrive at the study, but in that time Manwë managed to throw several ancient manuscripts to the floor and thoroughly upset one of the eagles, who’d built her nest on one of the bookshelves.

“Yes, my lord?” The herald’s glum face appeared in the doorway, followed by the rest of him.

“Summon the Valar to the Ring of Doom!” barked Manwë, in the process of shredding his favorite blanket just for the satisfaction of destroying something. (He was prone to colds and chilblains in the winter.) “This is a crisis, and we must take action!”

Eönwë shuffled a bow. “Yes, my lord. Shall I send word to the Elven kings to prepare their armies?”

“What? No! Don’t be absurd, Eönwë.” Manwë tossed the tattered blanket aside, the better to address his herald’s idiocy. “Why should we get the Elves involved in this?”

“You...you mean to say the Enemy has not broken loose?”

“No, of course not.” Honestly, what did Eönwë take him for? A thoroughly incompetent monarch? Surely he deserved more credit than that. Why, he had engineered the chaining of the Enemy in the first place! And very well it had served them all, too.

Eönwë’s dour face wrinkled. “Then, my lord, might I ask what the emergency is? If it’s not the Enemy, I don’t see what it could be.”

Manwë slammed his hands down on top of his cluttered desk, and a puff of dust rose. “It’s the blasted Valier, man! Pay attention!”

“The...the Valier, my lord?”

“Yes!” hissed Manwë. “They’re up to something, and I’ve let it go on too long. It’s time we got to the bottom of this once and for all.” He reached into the bottom drawer of his desk and pulled out his crown, which was honestly looking a little smudged. (Varda might have a point about taking better care of his things, but he would hardly tell her as much.)

“I will be in the Ring of Doom, waiting,” said Manwë to his chief Maia. “So you just make sure my  brethren get there soon.”

He strode out of the chaotic study without a backward glance, leaving a thoroughly consternated Eönwë behind.

#

The other six Valar arrived at the Ring of the Doom without much delay, and Manwë was gratified to see the looks of concern and urgency on their faces. It was nice to be taken seriously. (Varda never did.)

“What’s run amok?” asked Aulë. “For mercy’s sake, what’s gone amiss this time?” 

Manwë held up his hand to stop any further questions, and seated himself on his throne. He paused meaningfully, making eye contact with each individual Vala assembled. Then he steepled his fingers below his chin. “We need to get to the bottom of this Ladies-Only Camping Trip,” he said solemnly. 

The silence in response to his words was near-deafening.

Ulmo pinched the bridge of the nose as if the Tree-light were blinding him. “Please do not be so tiresome, brother,” he said. “Is this the only thing in all of Arda that currently concerns you?”

Oromë crossed his arms. “The rest of us don’t linger about, waiting for you to summon us,” he said. “I, for one, had important doings afoot.”

“Hear, hear!” cried Tulkas.

Manwë dared not ask what plans Oromë and Tulkas might have, for they were only half-dressed, and were smeared in something that could either be jam or blood (one never knew with the two of them).

Námo was silent as ever, expression unreadable. He wasn’t going to be much help, Manwë could see.

“Brethren,” said Manwë, “does it not concern you that our women disappear with no explanation? Is it safe for them? Dangers are most piercing when they come unanticipated.”

“What danger could possibly befall seven Valier who are camping well within sight of Taniquetil?” asked Ulmo. His scowl was as thunderous as a sea-squall. “It’s not as if they’re a lot of defenseless seal pups.”

“Hear, hear!” cried Tulkas.

In truth, Manwë didn’t have much to offer in support of his suspicions. And in truth, the problem wasn’t that Varda and the other Valier might be in danger; the problem was that he didn’t know what they were doing. Manwë hated nothing more than not-knowing. Something had to be done.

He spent the better part of an hour coaxing the other Valar to see his side of things, but to no avail. Normally it wasn’t so difficult to get the lot of them to obey his orders. (But normally Varda was with him. Things always seemed to run smoother when she was about, somehow.) Yet no matter how much he wheedled and coaxed and even begged, his six brethren were unmoved. They had better things to do than spy on the Valier, they said, and even if they didn’t, they all valued their peace and sanity too much to go meddling in things that had naught to do with them. Even Irmo refused to take action, and Manwë found that most unfair, because he knew for a fact that the Lord of Dreams had begged his spouse to go on the camping trip at least twice.

“Anyway, Manwë,” said Aulë after a while, “aren’t you glad to not have Varda second-guessing every bit of your comings and goings and...and your late-night snacks?” Spoken like a man who was very glad to be free of his spouse.

“I live alone,” said Ulmo, unnecessarily. “Yet it seems to me that Aulë has a point.”

“Hear, hear!” cried Tulkas.

Manwë threw up his hands. Hopeless. “Very well,” he said, pointing his sharp nose toward the sky. “You lot may all return to whatever it is you were doing. I will take the matter in hand, never fear.”

Námo sighed, and the reverberations spoke volumes.

#

It was simple, really, for Manwë to take the shape of a summer wind and follow the Valier. He was not Lord of the Breath of Arda just for show (well, all right, perhaps he was). In any case, Manwë blew down from his throne at Máhanaxar and across the plains of Aman to the forests between Lórien and the coast. Using his superior investigative skills, he quickly found the campsite he sought just as the Mingling was at its peak. Manwë-as-wind came closer to the circle of firelight, barely disturbing the blades of grass. Yet all his efforts at stealth nearly came to naught, for as soon as he caught a sight of the Valier, he loosed a gusty sigh of disgust that was near gale-force.

The Valier! They were…they were… 

They weren’t doing anything. 

Seven female figures were arranged around a large bonfire as if they were in one of the Vanyar’s poetic tableaux. Yavanna played a harp while Estë tooted a wooden flute that sounded like a nightingale. Nessa danced just behind them; Nienna sang under her breath. Vairë sat cross-legged next to Vána, eating roasted cheese and sipping wine. And Varda? His wife sat on the ground with her long legs stretched before her while she stared at her stars. 

The Lord of Arda felt dismay lodge in his windy breast. All of this fuss—centuries upon centuries of snide comments and unsubtle giggles—all over three nights spent doing nothing in the woods? How ridiculous. How utterly mystifying. How, how… womanlike! 

What on earth did the Valier need to make such a big fuss over their blasted Ladies-Only Camping Trip for? Couldn’t they sit around a fire and mope just as well in Valimar? Manwë certainly didn’t see what was so hilarious about this, either. 

It was certainly well and right that Eru Ilúvatar put the wiser, saner males in charge of things. If things were left up to the women, why…who knew what chaos would rule! But that was neither here nor there, for Manwë had wasted his time—valuable time that might have been used in finishing his model of Utumnno (he and Eönwë planned on thoroughly breaking it later) or eating Varda’s meat pies. Honestly, what a farce; this was the last time he put any effort into understanding the minds of the Valier. He was a busy man with many important duties. 

Manwë blew out of the forest clearing in a quiet storm, startling the birds who slept in the branches.

Yet if he had held his temper in check for just a moment more, he might have heard Varda’s undignified snort, followed by shrieks of laughter from the other Valier.

---

Chapter End Notes

This is a companion piece to Snowfall. If you enjoy humorous tales of Manwë the Incompetent, you might like that as well.