United, Divided: The War of Telerin Aggression by eris_of_imladris

Just Before The Battle, Mother

Just before the battle, mother,
I am thinking most of you,
While upon the field we're watching
With the enemy in view.

Nerdanel is restless the night before the slaughter.

She doesn’t even know why. She’s told herself too many times that she won’t pace around the empty house, looking down the dark corridors as if she’d find anything but stale air. And yet, her hands run along the walls, she breathes the air that still smells like home even after nothing is the same anymore.

She has no idea where her family is now, and she wonders if they think of her at all. If they regret leaving her behind on their journey to glory. She heard Fëanáro’s speech in the square, surely everyone did, when everything seemed so clear. The whole world had shifted from light to dark in an instant, and suddenly, his was the only fire for their people to follow.

But she’d seen the other side too, the people who looked not to Fëanáro but Nolofinwë. The ones who dared to whisper, to wonder aloud if the Valar should police their own. She knew Fëanáro’s answer before he spoke it, even before she felt the spike of anger crashing through the wall of grief he’d built so hastily yet solidly.

The enemy changed far too quickly, then. Fëanáro turned from the darkness and challenged what little light remained, and worst of all, he took her lights, after claiming to love her for so many years. She yearns for them, her soul cleaves to them, even though she does not know where they lay their heads at night.

She wonders how far they’ve gotten, if they’re thinking of her on the road. Each said goodbye to her one by one. Maitimo, too loyal for his own good, was first in this as he was in his birth, and she wonders if the world will ever see beauty like his again. Makalaurë, who will sing of darkness and war or perhaps never again. Tyelkormo, too proud. Carnistir, trying his hardest. Curufinwë, too eager to please, a puppy for whom someone has thrown a long-promised stick. All the way to the twins, who looked like they might stay, if they weren’t entangled in some oath of glory that turns the noblest of motives into the filthiest of wars.

Oh, I long to see you, mother,
And the loving ones at home,
But I'll never leave our banner,
Till in honor I can come.

She stays silent sometimes during the long night. When the silence becomes too pressing, she curses her husband’s damned pride and fights the urge to scream into the empty halls. They should not be filled with laughter, no, but they could be filled with the soft sounds of kindness, with the way he always leaned his head on hers when something pained his heart too deeply for words. She was not there when he found Finwë’s body, but she hears he cradled his father like a child, and the whole host fell silent in the mourning. They stood together, united in this as they seemed to be when they marched away.

But she knows better. How can unity form around a shattered soul? If Fëanáro cannot even see the enemy in front of him, if he cannot acknowledge that until the moment Finwë died he himself was the enemy of peace in Valinor, what hope does he have of the victory he desires? He burns too bright, but it’s not the kind of fire that can change this darkness. No fire birthed of darkness can glow with light.

And her boys, oh, they burn like firebrands, and no matter how kind or calm they are, they cannot ignore how their mighty father has fallen. Worst, she knows that if she heard her Fëanáro wailing his grief, if her eyes knew what her soul’s bond felt as it writhed inside her chest, she might have gone with him. That, she will admit to no one, not after word reaches her of what happened on that night after she collapses into her cold and lonely bed.

When word reaches her of the deeds of her husband, her Fëanáro who made her burst with joy every day of their lives together until he drew that sword, her Fëanáro who begged her to come even as she begged him to leave her a son, even just one, even if she was willing to leave the other six behind, even as she pictures them as the smallest children who can do no harm to an animal, let alone a person, who must even now be weeping for their innocence just as she weeps for them instead of the victims she should be crying for -

When she imagines them regretting their deeds, huddled together, drawing strength from the warmth of their living bodies against the backdrop of the Teleri dead, she feels like her own heart is against her. She still loves him, loves all of them, even when she hears the tale of that night. Even when she knows that, as she paced through her cold and empty home, her sons drew their swords and stained their souls in their father’s color. When her traitor’s heart wishes to have saved even one son, even if the other six stay fallen. For now she knows that she will never see any of them again, not until the world breaks apart. Even with Morgoth reigning in terror, her husband, her sons, they are the evil ones.

For all her wisdom, she is dumbstruck. For all her strength, she is pitiful, and for all her courage to stay behind, she stays alone, trapped by the stares and whispers and the crushing guilt as she imagines Alqualondë’s waters running with her family’s red.

For the love she still bears her family, she becomes the enemy.

Farewell, mother, you may never
Press me to your heart again,
But, oh, you'll not forget me, mother,
If I'm numbered with the slain.