Fill The Night With Stories by Klose

The Way That We Love

Fingolfin/Anairë, very loosely based on theme of "Five Things Anairë Hates About Fingolfin".

I've interpreted Anairë's remaining in Aman as a choice made from the beginning, that is, she did not leave Tirion and turn back (as I've written in "Bonfires of Trust, Flashfloods of Pain", also posted on this site).

Written December 2007, originally posted on LiveJournal.

The sight of Nolofinwë, and the knowledge that he is nearby, affects Anairë in ways she does not quite like. First comes the strange leaping in her chest, and the sudden quickening of her heartbeat - then, the irrational plotting to get his attention: perhaps by accidentally dropping her shawl in his vicinity or spilling her drink on him.

Anairë isn't sure who is more frustrating: him, for making her think these things, or her, for having these mad delusions in the first place.

He has only to look at her, his lips parted in an earnest smile, and she forgets to balk.

***

"Twelve years in exile?" says Anairë, punctuating her words with a derisive laugh.

"It is harsh, do you not think?" says Nolofinwë.

"A babe would not even be full-grown by the end of that time. It is certainly no less than Fëanàro deserves, for what he did to you."

Nolofinwë does not reply.

"What happened next?" Anairë asks, sighing.

"I said that I would release him from his restitution, at the end of the twelve years."

Anairë tries not to sigh again. She almost wants to think he had done this, not so much out of brotherly love (or was it obsession, for all that it was requited?), but out of an awareness that doing so would better him in the eyes of their people.

It is terrible for her to hope that her husband was capable of such cunning and manipulation, she knows. But it seems to her that the alternative is worse; that he would be so naïve as to hope this would gain him Fëanàro's affection. Nolofinwë calls him brother; they are not brothers. What shared memories are there, where is the emotional connection?

Anairë wonders if she supposed to pity her husband, or slap him instead.

***

The weeks of preparation for the departure to Middle-earth are filled with arguments and tears.

In the end, Anairë can only kiss her children goodbye, and bestow them with gifts. Cloaks and ornaments for all; way-bread for her sons, the secret of its making for her daughter.

For her husband, Anairë has nothing – for he is the one leading them on this misguided quest, away from Valinor, and away from her. Anairë carried each child in her womb and nurtured them - yet it is Nolofinwë who holds their hearts.

It is more than she can bear to give him.

***

How many millennia have passed – how many since they left? The House that Nolofinwë built still stands proud in the heart of Tirion. The pillars remain, and the walls, but so much else has rotted to dust. Trinkets, books, clothing, vanity tables, sculptures and paintings… her marriage bed. Imprints of her family, succumbed to the ravages of time and mortality.

Fates they shared with their masters, for none of them returned, save for Itarillë. Anecdotes are passed about the glorious deaths of her children and husband, but it is senseless, all of it senseless. Lives of worth, bright burning flames, all cruelly extinguished.

They dwell now in the House of Mandos, but their specters remain in the halls of their old home: Findekàno, Turukàno, Arakàno, Irissë, Nolofinwë… always, always Nolofinwë.

Anairë would hate him, for taking everything from her, for leaving, for not coming back. For making her this bitter, bereaved creature that she is, she would hate him.

She would, but she does not. Fallen since the first time he smiled at her, when something deep within her stirred so potently that she has not forgotten it.

What Anairë does hate, however, is how even after all the years and anguish and loneliness - even after all of that, she still loves Nolofinwë.