The Small and Secret Things by Dawn Felagund

There Was Long Ago a Tree

Nerdanel remembers life before the Darkening and her estrangement from Fëanor. This is a weird tribble (300 words) with some darker themes but nothing graphic. It was inspired by Noliel's much brighter Swinging in the Rain for Seven in '07.

There was long ago a tree that held a swing and upon it, love was kindled. Fëanor's hands upon her back, pushing her, warming skin cold and unloved.

Daily, she sat in the swing and closed her eyes and

were those hands?

let the newborn Sun still so strange in the sky--so painful, so wrong--warm her back.

In place of his hands.

The breeze pushed her gently upon the swing, upon the tree that had grown old and died without the Light of the Trees to grant it life everlasting, until it was a gnarled husk, angry branches scratching the sky.

Long ago, he'd pushed her here. Long ago, he'd gone too far, too hard, not understanding when her screams of joy turned to fear and gravity seized her and dragged her to the earth. You do not belong here, in the sky, amid the clouds and Light. Long ago, she'd bled and wept and his hands caught her tears and stemmed her blood, and she knew, no matter what the others said--among them her father--that he could set aside his own desires to love her as she supposedly deserved.

But now, the tree was dead and dried, and the hands that had pushed her/healed her/loved her had been reduced to ash and borne upon the west winds to the halls of Mandos.

Feet firm upon the ground, she pushed herself.

Higher and higher she arced, and she never knew when sobs turned to screams of laughter.

The dried-dead bough of the tree broke. Sent her sailing into gravity's embrace, yanked back to the earth.

This time, there were no tears.

Only blood.

And with a lap of her tongue and a swipe with the hem of her tunic, yes, that was gone too.

Chapter End Notes

Today's word:

sere SEER, adjective:

Dry; withered.

Sere comes from Old English sear, "dry."