Quoth the Raven by Noliel

Nevermore

Read Nevermore

The threads, as deceptively fragile as their mistress, weave into existence. Slim, pale fingers work the loom, and Míriel lets a ghost of a smile flit across her face as she senses Finwë's presence behind her. His approach is silent, and for a moment, she is reminded of his attempts to sneak up on her when they had both been alive.

"Welcome," she murmurs without turning, her smile becoming more substantial. It had not worked then, either. A soft chuckle echoes near her ears, and the former High King of the Noldor places his larger hands over her own, stilling them.

"Indeed."

She leans back into the warmth she has been without for what seems like Ages, and lets her eyelids slowly, lazily slide shut, her hands moving with startling speed as she begins to weave once more. A sharp exhale flutters her hair at her movements, and though she cannot see, she knows, she remembers what the look in Finwë's eyes would be like. Admiring, affectionate, perhaps a trifle amused at her irrepressible desire to showcase her talents. She never could resist an opportunity to show off.

Warm, firm hands- and only she knows how she's longed for them- press themselves onto her shoulders, nigh-reverent kisses placed into her hair and sweet, insensible things whispered. She can feel his nose nuzzling at the nape of her neck, and hums contentedly, tilting her head back and to the side. This meeting is different from usual; if she did not know better, she would have said there was a sense of urgency in the fervent kisses pressed to her throat. A laughable idea, this urgency, in a place where time is meaningless. After all, it is not as though they don't have eternity to—

The threads snap.

A broken sigh escapes Míriel as she opens her eyes to see what her hands have just drawn. In all the countless years of her weaving, both living and no, she cannot recall a time when so many threads decided to break at once. There must be a... a...

Finwë's fingers slow their combing of her tumbling silver locks as she begins to shake her head in disbelief at the sight before her. A mistake. It's wrong, it must be, because she will not.

"No..." and she turns to look with wide eyes into his open, tender face. "I won't. I..."

Finwë's hand is gentle but persistent against her lips, a gesture so familiar and reminiscent of their life together that Míriel quiets, eyes mutely, frantically questioning his own with something like panic.

"You will, my jewel." The grey of his eyes begins to shimmer, but his gaze doesn't turn away. And wrong, this is all wrong, terribly, terribly wrong, because—

"I will not leave you like this, Finwë, and I would dearly like to see anyone attempt to force me to do so." Her musical voice wavers but grows louder, more furious with each word against the smoothness of his palm. (How often had they argued like this during their life, both playfully and seriously? She remembers one time when, in an almost identical situation, she'd bit him. Hard.) "Do you hear me? I ask you, do you hear me? Not now, not ever again—"

"It is I who would not have you stay here," Finwë interrupts her fiercely, quickly. Míriel's lips continue soundlessly as her eyes fill with pain at his words, and she slowly pushes his hand away from her face. (And of course, she'd apologized profusely after Finwë had finished yowling and flailing his injured fingers in cool water, but Finwë had only flicked his wet hand at her face, grinned that lopsided grin of his, and said he rather liked it.)

He flinches at her stabbed expression and then breathes out harshly, trapping those skilled hands of hers in his before she can completely pull away, and continues, "Please listen to me, my beloved. I would not have you stay because I cannot bear to damn you to this existence any longer." The broideress opens her mouth but he cuts her off, "You shall leave, because I will remain."

She gets up then, and pushes him back roughly, shoves. He stumbles, surprised more at the sudden, violent twist of her lips than at her actions. "No! Finwë, you cannot do this to yourself. You do not know what it is to live like this—" Míriel breaks off with a biting laugh, reaching up to grasp his face tightly, "To live. Nay, to not live. Beloved, you cannot know—"

"As you once did not," he replies, and his mouth hardens involuntarily. Míriel's grip loosens at his halting, bitter words, her thumbs brushing the edges of his lips until they soften. Finwë turns his face, deftly takes one thumb-tip into his mouth, and Míriel shudders lightly, her hands flitting over his jawline as he exhales, soft and warm. Warm.

"Oh, my stubborn, hasty one. Did you truly think I was a fool, back then, who did not know that even as you made your decision you regretted it? That all those years, you wove and watched—" he nods, a sharp jerk of his dark head, towards the loom,"and suffered?"

"If you were not a fool, then you would have known why, also." Her voice is nearly inaudible. Finwë inclines his head at the unspoken implication, and Míriel can see as well as feel the quirk of his lips.

"As you will. Yes, I was once a fool, but no more do I question your decision. Yet tell me: what do you believe I will do if I leave here? Live, breathe, laugh, and love, knowing all the while where you were? No. Never again will I let you go through that, though all the wisdom of Mandos bade me do so. And if I must stay here for all eternity to prevent it, then so be it. I... I chose this path well before my death, Míriel."

There is a silence, but it is not the silence she remembers. No longer comfortable, no longer content, it is the silence of words unspoken rather than absent, a silence that is there to be broken. Her hands fall listlessly away from his face, his throat, and return to her side, her silvery head fighting the urge to bow in defeat. He reaches for her as though in entreaty but she turns around, denying herself rather than him the comfort of an embrace. Through the keening anguish, Míriel thinks how ironic it is that she has not felt this alive for so long. The pain is a welcome change from the deadly ennui that has plagued her for many years, and she savours it, welcomes it even as it shreds her heart.

She is so cold.

"It is as I deserve, then," Míriel says detachedly, almost reflectively to the grey stones that are blurring rapidly beneath her feet, and oh the truth of those words tastes like the sharp tang of blood. Something hot runs down her cheeks and she raises startled fingers to her face that are wet when she draws them away. First the threads, and now this. She wants to laugh. A frustrated sound is all that heralds the unexpected cage of Finwë's arms, pulling her tight and safe against his chest, and try as she might she cannot bring herself to struggle. It's humbling, this desperation gnawing at her to snatch at whatever she can, anything, to sweeten the exile she has brought upon herself.

"No." His voice is forceful even when muffled by her hair, unmistakeably him. "Oh, no. You'll not do this to me, Míriel. This choice was not yours to make, not this time."

It's strange, but with those words it feels as if a burden is lifted from her, a staggering, ageless weight from her slender shoulders that she hadn't even known was ever there. Míriel straightens, turns to raise her damp eyes to her husband's determined, imploring face that is mere heartbeats from her own. Sees him notice the tears she never shed while alive, hears him swallow convulsively. Not this time...

She smiles faintly and leans in. And then there is only darkness, and Finwë, and for the first time in an eternity, Míriel is warm.

---

Chapter End Notes

Written over two years ago and finally polished enough to post, entirely too romantic, and I suspect I'm using a lot of artistic license with this-- giving them both corporeal forms, for example, with little supporting evidence, but it makes for a better story. 

As I can't remember any of the references which first prompted me to write this, not exactly, you'll have to go with me on faith that it's based in one of the HoME books. War of the Jewels, I believe. Alas. (It was concerning Finwe choosing to stay within Mandos so that both Indis and Miriel could coexist in Aman without the Statute being broken, if I recall correctly.)