The Kids Are All Right by grey_gazania

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Chapter 3

The winter grew even more fierce, but in some ways the Elves of Balar were lucky. When the worst blizzard yet came howling across the island, it came mid-morning, giving people enough warning to congregate inside. Packed into the meeting hall with the rest of the neighborhood, Ereiniel watched as the drifts of snow outside grew higher and higher, first reaching the windowsills, then covering the windows completely, making the room grow dark until more candles and lamps were lit.

 

In the afternoon, to pass the time, Henthael pulled out the big chalkboard and the slates, and he gathered some of the older children for an impromptu lesson in shorthand. Gildor, whose ankle still couldn’t bear weight but who had begun to limp about the place on a pair of crutches, was watching with interest.

 

“Fascinating,” he said, when Henthael paused in his teaching while his students practiced. “Is that Rúmil’s shorthand?”

 

Henthael nodded. “Adapted slightly for use with Sindarin, but yes,” he said. “I teach some of the neighborhood children every few winters. It keeps them occupied in the evenings. Admittedly, we usually only spend a few weeks on it, so most of them are passable at best. But Erestor here could make a craft of it if he wanted to. Between his handwriting and his memory, he’d make a good scribe.”

 

“Yes, you’ve said that before,” Erestor answered, looking up from the book he’d borrowed from Balar’s ragbag library; not much literature had survived the sack of the Falas. “But I don’t want to be a scribe. I want to be a loremaster.”

 

“Rúmil was a loremaster, young man, and the inventor of our first alphabet,” Henthael said. “You have to start somewhere, and there are worse ways to make a living than by writing things down.”

 

Gildor peered over Ereiniel’s shoulder at the slate in front of her and saw that, rather than copying the shorthand symbols as he’d thought, she was instead copying out a few lines of rather shaky tengwar.

 

“I’m trying to learn to write with my right hand,” she explained. “Since Gurvadhor has me learning to wield a sword with both hands, I figured I ought to do the same with a pen.”

 

“Ah, you’re a lefty,” he said. “It’s easier to write sarati with the left hand than it is to write tengwar, I’ve heard. Is that true?” 

 

“Only because most left-handed children develop bad habits that never get corrected,” Henthael said, though he wasn’t who the question had been aimed at. “Ereiniel here was lucky, because the king was also left-handed, so he was able to advise her parents on proper techniques for her. It’s all about the grip and the angle of the paper.”

 

The king, of course, being Fingolfin. To Henthael, there was no other king worth mentioning.

 

The afternoon dragged on into the evening. There was no chance of returning to their homes for the night, so Little Mithrim’s residents cooked and ate a meal from the communal food supplies and then prepared to bed down for the night. 

 

Ereiniel found herself squeezed between her mother and Maewen, with Maewen’s mother on Maewen’s other side and a few blankets shared out between them. Most of the people in the hall fell asleep quickly, but Ereiniel found herself lying awake, staring at the ceiling as she lay still, not wanting to disturb anyone by tossing and turning.

 

The trouble was Maewen. In some ways it was torment – lying beside her friend, seeing the soft swell of her breasts rise and fall, feeling her breath tickle Ereiniel’s cheek.

 

They had played at romance when they were younger, wondering what it would be like to kiss a boy and practicing with each other to see how it would feel, all giggles and flushed cheeks and warm lips. Ereiniel still didn’t know anything about kissing boys, but she knew all about kissing Maewen.

 

She’d liked kissing Maewen.

 

But Maewen had her eye on Thínion, a quiet potter’s apprentice from Brithombar, and besides, that wasn’t how things were done among the Elves. Women were meant to be with men, and men were meant to be with women. As disappointing as it seemed to Ereiniel, she knew that it was just the way things were. She knew that there was no point in confessing her feelings to anyone, let alone Maewen herself. She would simply have to learn to move on.

 

Eventually she drifted off, her last thought being that the world was deeply, deeply unfair.

 

***********

 

They were snowed in for three full days, but on the fourth day, some of the men managed to dig out a path from the door. Soon others joined in, and Ereiniel and Henthael wound up working together to clear a path to the smokehouses through six feet of snow. It was hard work, and sweaty, and after a while they both took off their cloaks, counting on exertion and their woolen sweaters to keep them warm.

 

“I’ve never seen snow this deep before,” Ereiniel said, clearing another shovelful from their path with a grunt. “Not even visiting Haru in the mountains at Barad Eithel for Midwinter. It’s unnatural.” And then, because she knew that Henthael – who was a realist to the bone – wouldn’t accuse her of being gloomy, she added, “It has to be Morgoth’s work. First Nargothrond, now this weather… His reach keeps growing longer and longer.”

 

Balar’s main advantage was its location – as an island, it was protected from Morgoth’s orcs, who feared the ocean and its wrath. But the ocean posed no barrier to the weather. Nor, Ereiniel thought, would it pose a barrier to anything that flew, and Morgoth was surely hard at work creating new monstrous creatures to help him wage his war against the Elves. He wouldn’t stop until he had wiped out all resistance.

 

Someday, he would find a way to make a winged dragon, and then Balar would be doomed.

 

Henthael paused, leaning on his shovel, and said, “I think you’re right. And I think, sooner or later, we’re going to have to fight again if we plan to survive. There’s nowhere left to go. Right now we’re an afterthought, because we’re not a threat. But that won’t last forever.”

 

“That’s what I told Maewen,” Ereiniel said. “She told me to hold onto hope, but…it’s hard, you know? There’s not a lot of hope to go around. I don’t even know what to do with my own life, let alone how to successfully defy Morgoth.”

 

Her grandfather had tried to defy Morgoth. Her father had tried to defy Morgoth. Morgoth and his servants had killed them both. What hope did she have of succeeding where they had failed? 

 

“Maewen would say that we’re defying Morgoth by staying alive,” Henthael said. “But she has a naturally sunny and optimistic disposition.”

 

“She does. I wish I could be like that, sometimes.” Ereiniel jabbed her shovel back into the snowbank. “Instead I just…shovel snow. Make fishing nets. Feel trapped.”

 

It was easy to be honest with Henthael. For all his bluster and occasional tactlessness, he’d always had a kind word or gesture for her from the time she was a small child visiting her grandfather – a boiled sweet, or praise for how well he’d heard she was doing in her lessons. And since the destruction of the Falas, since Ereiniel had first discovered how to use the Elessar, he’d stepped in to take over part of her education – the intricacies of government and the reality of politics, the difficult choices that had faced her grandfather and, later, her father.

 

He always made time for her, and he’d told her once that he’d seen an echo of his king that day, on the boat to Balar. Ereiniel thought that was just about the highest compliment anyone had ever given her.

 

Heaving another shovelful clear of the path, Henthael said, “You underestimate yourself. You give me hope, Ereiniel. Fingolfin is alive in you. I’m sure Turgon is doing right by his people in Gondolin, but the rest of us haven’t seen Turgon in hundreds of years, unless you count a glimpse on the battlefield. We’re not like the Sindar. We’re not used to our royalty shutting themselves away. Everyone knew Finwë. Everyone knew Fingolfin. Everyone knew Fingon, too, and while your father and I may have had our differences, I will say that he was always there for his people. He did his level best to listen to us and do right by us, and I respected that.”

 

“So you’re saying, since my uncle is hiding away in Gondolin, I’m the next best thing?” Ereiniel asked, skepticism audible in her voice.

 

“I’m saying that you represent something bigger than yourself,” Henthael said. “If you were a boy, you’d be next in the line of succession. Think about that. You’ve got a good head on your shoulders, Ereiniel. Think about what you already do for your people, and think about how to build on that, instead of worrying because you haven’t found a craft yet.”

 

They both fell silent and returned to their work, but Ereiniel pondered Henthael’s words as she shoveled. What did she do for her people? Apart from using the Elessar, she mostly felt like she did the chores. She helped her mother make medicines. She shoveled snow. She made fishing nets, and went out on the boats, and gutted the fish and prepared them for smoking. She fed the sheep, and helped with herding and the shearing and the lambing. She helped repair roofs and walls that had been damaged by wind or rain. She took her turn on privy-cleaning duty without complaint. Wherever a spare hand was needed, there she went.

 

Maybe that was Henthael’s point. Maybe toiling alongside her neighbors meant more than she thought it did. What was it Celebrimbor had said? We’re at our best when we cooperate. We’re not meant to work alone.

 

Maybe there was a way forward.

 

***********

 

She didn’t mention her thoughts to anyone for several days, not until she had a concrete plan in her head. But the following week after dinner, as she sat repairing the sole of one of her mother’s boots while her mother darned socks, she said, very quietly, “Hey, Nana? I’ve got something to tell you. But you have to promise not to laugh.”

 

“Why would I laugh at you?” Ianneth said, raising her dark brows.

 

“I don’t know,” Ereiniel said. “I’m just nervous.” She swallowed, steeling herself, and then said, “You know how neighborhood council elections are going to be held after Midwinter? Well, I want to run for a seat.”

 

Ianneth simply gazed at her for a moment, but then put aside the sock in her hands and turned to fully face her daughter. “That’s a big responsibility,” she said, though her voice was placid. “What brought this on?”

 

“I was talking to Henthael,” Ereiniel said, “and he said some things that made me think. I want to start doing more for people. I think…maybe I have a duty to do more for people. To make sure everyone’s needs are met and everyone’s voice is heard. That’s something Ada and Haru both tried to do, and I shouldn’t be doing any less.” She paused, looking at her mother’s face, and asked, “You’re not going to tell me not to do it, are you?”

 

“Of course not,” Ianneth said. “If you want to try your hand at politics, by all means, try your hand at politics. But know that it’ll be a lot of hard work.”

 

“I’m not scared of hard work.”

 

“No, you’re not,” Ianneth said, smiling gently at her daughter. “But what I meant was that you’ll need to put in a lot of hard work just to run at all, whether you win or lose. You’ll need a platform, a reason for people to vote for you. You’ll need a strategy.”

 

Feeling a bit of the weight she’d been carrying leave her shoulders, now that she had confessed the idea and not been shot down, Ereiniel asked, “Will you help? I mean, I know you’ve never been officially involved in politics, but you do know quite a lot regardless. I remember that Ada used to ask you for advice. He said he counted on you to be sensible for him.”

 

“Of course.” Ianneth picked up her darning once again and said, “I assume you haven’t told anyone else yet? You should tell Henthael and Gurvadhor. I think they’d both be willing to give you advice. Henthael especially. He has a great deal of faith in you, Ereiniel. Why don’t you talk it over with them both tomorrow?”

 

***********

 

Ereiniel told Gurvadhor the next morning over her combat lesson – wielding a shield and a spear this time, the spear being Ereiniel’s preferred weapon. The snow was still ankle-deep, hindering both their movements, but as Gurvadhor had often said, you didn’t get to pick the battlefield conditions or the weather.

 

Apart from the snow, it had been a good session. She’d won two bouts out of three, and Gurvadhor had praised her improvement in using a shield for offense as well as defense. Now, as they both did their cool-down stretches, he said, “It’s an intriguing proposition. I think you have potential, if that’s what you’re asking, though it may take you a little time to find your feet. But I’m not sure that I have any particular wisdom to offer. I was an army captain, not a councilor. It’s true that Fingon was one of my dearest friends, but anything I know about politics I learned only by observation.”

 

Henthael was more positive. When Ereiniel confided in him after her afternoon lessons with Madam Ithrin, he said, “Well, that’s not where I expected you to go after our conversation, but I think it’s a good idea. When you’re not bickering with Erestor, you do have a gift for defusing arguments.” With a wry half-smile, he added, “I know that disappointed look of yours stops me in my tracks every time.”

 

“It’s just a shame that I have to pull it out so often,” Ereiniel said, though her voice was light and teasing, free of any rancor.

 

“Yes, well.” Henthael cleared his throat. “At any rate, I think you’re on the right track, and I’d be glad to help you.”

 

Impulsively, Ereiniel threw her arms around him in a hug. “I don’t know what I’d do without you, Henthael,” she said. “You and Gurvadhor, you’ve been like uncles to me. You’re always there. I can always count on you.”

 

Henthael didn’t answer, but the way his arms tightened around her as he hugged her back said more than any words ever could.

Chapter End Notes

Nana (S.) - mom

Ada (S.) - dad

Haru (Q.) - granddad (in this case, Fingolfin)

 

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