Flower Song by StarSpray

Flower Song

Lúcellë was not fond of the city. Tirion was by no means an ugly place, but it was too many people living too close together, and though there were many trees growing along the streets and many beautiful gardens, there were not enough, at least for her tastes. But Nerdanel and Fëanáro were to be found—when they were not off wandering the wilds—either in Tirion in their own luxurious suite of rooms in the palace, or in the sprawling house Fëanáro had built just outside Tirion, with a dozen different workshops for several dozen different crafts, and room for both of them to take on students if they wished, and for friends and family to visit at any time. 

As Lúcellë entered the courtyard, which was missing the fountain that had been there previously, instead sporting a much less attractive hole in the ground, a young voice called out to her from above. “Aunt Lúcellë!” She looked up to find Macalaurë hanging out of a window, waving, with his dark hair falling over his shoulders and into his eyes. 

“Hello, nephew!” she called. “Is your mother at home?”

“No.” Macalaurë vanished into the window, and by the time Lúcellë made it into the house he was bounding down the stairs. “No one is, except me. Maitimo is in Alqualondë with Uncle Arafinwë and Aunt Eärwen, Atya has gone to Aulë’s Halls, and Ammë is visiting Lady Indis.”

“Why did you not go with your mother, or with Fëanáro?” Lúcellë asked.

Macalaurë rolled his eyes. “Because I am not allowed to go anywhere,” he said, with all the frustrated petulance of a child on the cusp of adolescence. He had not yet hit his growth spurt, but already he was turning all elbows and knees, and his face beginning to lose the roundness of childhood. Lúcellë noticed it all with a pang, seeing how quickly her nephews were growing. It seemed just yesterday that Macalaurë had come into the world, screaming louder than any infant the midwives had claimed ever to have heard.

“Why ever not?”

Macalaurë’s gaze dropped to the floor, where he scuffed one bare foot on the tile, hands shoved into his pockets—the very picture of adolescent sulkiness. “I…may have accidentally broken one of Atya’s projects.”

“Oh, Macalaurë,” Lúcellë sighed. “How did you manage that?”

“I was carrying something into the workshop and I didn’t see it. And I didn’t know it was glass. Atya never works with glass! But I’m not allowed in any of the workshops until Atya gets home, and I couldn’t go with Maitimo to Alqualondë.”

“And why are you not with Nerdanel?” Lúcellë asked, curious.

Macalaurë wrinkled his nose. “No one else is in the city,” he said. “Except Aunt Anairë and little cousin Findekáno, but he’s a baby.”

Findekáno was not that much younger than Macalaurë, but Lúcellë didn’t argue the point. The gap was big enough for them to have little in common at present. “Fair enough,” she said. “Well, you’ll just have to spend the afternoon with me, unless you have something better to do.”

“I don’t have anything to do,” Macalaurë said. “It’s so boring with Maitimo away!”

“Well, come on then,” Lúcellë said, grabbing his hand. “I have a new song of growth and vibrancy that I want to try on the flowers here. Would you like to learn it?” As she knew he would, Macalaurë brightened immediately. He always wanted to learn a new song, even if he would likely never use it on his own. If only he could extend that eagerness to other subjects!

They passed through the house, leaving Lúcellë’s things to be taken up to her usual room, and greeting the staff, and stepped outside again into the garden, all lush bushes and swaths of flowers, and a few thick-trunked trees soaring up skyward, where birds gathered to nest and sing to one another and to anyone underneath who cared to listen. 

Lúcellë passed by a tall lilac bush laden with purple blooms, and an herb garden overflowing with greenery, and found a spot with the most flowers—violets and lilies clustering together, with peonies surrounding, and trellises laden with roses overhead. The air was sweet with their fragrances, and the buzzing of bees going from bloom to bloom. Butterflies too flitted about, bright as gems in the golden light of Laurelin. She sat down in the grass and clover, and Macalaurë sat with her. A hummingbird, glinting even brighter than the butterflies, paused to hover between them before darting away to seek more nectar. “Do you need music?” Macalaurë asked. “I can fetch my harp.”

“No,” Lúcellë said, smiling at him. “Just my voice, and the breeze in the leaves, and the birds in the trees.” She closed her eyes and listened to a lark nearby for a moment, singing its merry song, and then began her own song, of bright colors and sweet nectar, and summer breezes under clear blue skies; of roots sinking deep into rich soil and of dew-specked leaves unfurling. She finished the song and started again, and this time Macalaurë joined her. She could feel the Power underlying his voice, and Lúcellë knew that one day he would be able to sing all the flowers in Tirion into bloom at once, if he so wished, without ever stirring from his own garden. 

When she opened her eyes, Lúcellë found the garden a riot of brilliant color, even mores than before. The lilies and peonies seemed taller, too, and their stems more robust. Macalaurë laughed with delight as he leaned in to smell the lilies. “Do you have other songs, Aunt?” he asked. “Will you teach me?”

“I will teach you all of the songs I know, if you wish,” Lúcellë said. 

His smile was bright as the Trees at Mingling. “Yes, please!”