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mists-of-hithlum · 4 years

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A late piece for finwëan ladies week day 6. I went with the textual ghost approach, so have an overly long story about Fingon’s and Curufin’s wife in Mandos’ halls. Warnings for reference to death and torture (Celebrimbor is not having a fun time) but nothing too graphic. Also, this is unbeta’d, so if you catch any mistakes, just tell me.

The truth is that Mandos` halls are supremely boring.

Ranië lost track long ago how much time she has spent here. She came here after the Nirnaeth, how they called the last great battle of the elves and men against Morgoth. She is not sad about dying, exactly. Endor was a dangerous place and death lurked around every corner. Especially after the Dagor Bragollach, they all knew Morgoth`s beasts could attack at any moment.

She does not grieve for herself but she does mourn. She mourns for all who fell beside her, the time with her son she will never have, and for her husband`s death, too, even if there had never been love between them. Respect, of course, but never love. Her son was the result of practicality. She had wanted a child. He needed an heir. But Findecano had been a good man and a good king and so she mourns for him even if she will never mourn him like a proper elven lady would mourn her husband.

It is quiet in the halls. Fëar are everywhere and they talk but no sound carries here if they don’t want it. The halls are endless and a younger Ranië would have squealed completely unladylike if she would have been allowed to explore this place. But the truth of it is that exploration here is no fun. All the walls and the chambers and the ceilings look the same. The only thing that changes are the tapestries on the walls.

They are gorgeous. Ranië knew that she wasn’t the best needleworker of the Noldor – that honor would always belong to the first queen, the famous Miriël Serindë – but even she could say that those tapestries were the work of someone who knew everything about her craft. Vairë most likely made them, or one of her many Maiar.

The ways of the Valar are strange and the tapestries were no exception. In the long time Ranië had spent exploring the halls, she had found hundreds upon hundreds of tapestries. They showed a long gone past, the present and rumors said, even the future. She had always hoped to never encounter one of those rumored tapestries and until now, her luck had always held. It made her still shudder, the knowledge that the Valar knew exactly, what was going to happen. That knowledge must be a terrible burden.

But even tapestries greater than anything she had ever seen before lost their appeal sometime. Every time she looked at them, her hands itched for thread and wool. She missed her crochet hook, the knitting supplies and the little workshop she had put together in Endor. There was just nothing to create in the halls of Mandos and it made the Noldor restless. So they did the only thing they still could: Talk.

Celumenna smiled as she felt Ranië`s fëa come near.

“Back so soon?” she greeted her friend and frequent companion.

“There is just nothing to do.” Ranië`s fëa flickered unhappily. The darker strike over her breast was the only part that didn’t change color. When a balrog had struck at her with his fiery whip, it had melted straight through her armour and left a permanent mark on her fëa. “I needed company.”

“Then I am glad you came.”

Ranië was even more restless lately than usual.

“Something does not feel right,” her friend says. “I fear a new storm is coming over middle earth.”

Celumënna has long since stopped questioning other elves when they say things like this with an air of conviction. Too many people of her folk have at least flashes of foresight and it is always better to treat such things as the truth.

“It feels like it did before the battle.”

Ranië rarely talks about her death. Celumënna was already in the halls of Mandos when her friend and her husband died. Technically the two of them are related by marriage but both Celumenna and Ranië do their hardest to not think about how many kings and murderers (or sometimes both) are related to them. The only thing Lalwen ever said about the battle she had fought and died for on the side of the wife of her nephew – except for curses against Morgoth and the traitors and comments about military strategy – was: “At least it was a quick death.” It gives Celumenna a pained expression to think about the fact that she is glad as well but they had learned in Endor the hard way that sometimes a quick death was the best outcome.

“At least we can’t die again.”

Relief floods Celumenna when Ranië snorts. She doesn’t like it when her friend is so quiet and thoughtful. It just doesn’t seem to fit with Ranië`s tendency to listen to instructions and then do her own thing anyway because it was better and instructions were stupid anyway. Hotheaded and stubborn. A proper Noldo.

They were in one of the halls the furthest in the back – if something could even be in the back when this place had no end and every corridor would lead you everywhere – when they heard the commotion. One look at Ranië`s face confirmed that it was most likely important. So they left their fascinating discussion about the proper way to build a defense wall for a city – Celumenna was adamant it should be able to be easily reconstructed in case the enemy broke through but Ranië insisted the enemy was not supposed to break through in the first place – and went for the entrance hall.

If a fëa had knees Celumenna would have fallen to the floor the instant she entered the room. Instead, she screams.

Fire rushes through her fëa, burning everything in its path. There is blood, everywhere, and a new pain pops up every time she tries to move. She can’t focus. Everything is pain, pain, pain….

“...enna? Celumenna!”

It takes great strength for her to focus on the voice in her mind. It is not spoken loud but a product of the faint bond Ranië and her have formed in their time in the halls of Mandos.

“Ranië?”

“Stay here. Stay with me. Don’t you dare…”

The rest of Ranië`s frantic commands are lost as a new wave of pain breaks the connection.

This time, she recognizes it as the vision it is. Those hands with missing fingers aren’t her own. The fire wracking her body is not really in the halls of Mandos. It makes it no bit better.

“Please,” she hears when she snaps out of it the next time. “Please. Help her.” It`s not only Ranië now. She can feel the presences of her family around her. Her husband lies at her side and from the bond they still – again – share, she can tell he is in similar pain. She vaguely recognizes Lalwen grimly holding on to her fëa together with Ranië – “Don’t you dare let go now” – and Fingon, who has a concentrated expression on his face. Curufin is busy speaking with his brother mind to mind when they both get yanked away again.

This time, Celumenna only starts screaming after the vision has let them go. Curufin has an expression like a warrior after his first kill. Completely gone in shock. “No,” he whispers, again and again.

Celumenna is not capable of forming words. Not Tyelpë, her fëa and mind scream as one. Not our son! She can feel the same despair and grief and hopelessness and anger and rage from her husband as well.

“He… was innocent,” she manages to choke out. “He was innocent!” She screams it until the pain takes her away again.

This time, she gets back with the image of fiery red hair, blood spots on a pale face and a cruel grin. A grin they all know all too well.

“Gorthaur,” Curufin half whispers, half hisses to her side. About half of the people in attendance flinch. This is also the moment where Celumenna recognizes who has joined them as well.

It’s Namo. Of course is it Namo. And the bloody fool stands there like there was nothing to do for the two fëar he was meant to guard. Typical Valar. The rage in her fëa begins to boil. She will never know if it was her, Curvo or both of them, but suddenly she is on her feet again and tries to get to Namo. If she can do nothing for her son now, only endure his suffering like he does, she will bloody well make sure that the ones responsible will suffer as well. Namo and his justice can go burn in the void for all she cares right now. But if he lets her son at the mercy of one of them – again! Just like they always did to their house – she will see if Valar bleed as red as Tyelpë does. It takes the combined might of Lalwen, Ranië and Fingon to hold her back. The only reason her husband is only spitting curses against the Valar in an increasingly frantic voice is that all of his brothers have united to stop him from honoring the family tradition of trying to fight the Ainur. They cannot do anything for their child, nephew, cousin, grandchild. But they will not let him suffer alone, and they will not forget his sacrifice. If they can only watch, they will at least do that. So the House of Finwë settles down in Mandos` Halls, completely ignoring everything and everyone around them, and watch, so they are there to pick up the pieces when stubborn, brilliant little Tyelpë will finally give up and come home.

It takes centuries for something like this to happen again and Ranië would have given a lot for it to never happen again. Tyelperinquar – or Celebrimbor, like he insists to be called – has settled into the halls of Mandos as well as one could expect for one tortured to death by Sauron of all people. He is still frightened of unknown fëar but talking to his uncle Maedhros has certainly helped. Celumenna`s husband had alse proposed Finrod, but he had already been out of the Halls since before Ranië even left her body back in Endor and Celebrimbor was by far not ready yet to leave the Halls. Lalwen leaves, some centuries after Celebrimbor`s arrival, quoting she didn`t want her sister alone any longer. Fingolfin takes longer than his sister, but he too left some time ago. But Fingon stays stubbornly, insisting he won’t leave without Maedhros. Ranië suspects he too wants to know about their son, now the longest reigning High King of the Noldor since Finwë himself. And even if they don’t get a lot of news here in the Halls, some information is still better than none. Not that she can blame him, when she too is waiting for a dear friend and her son. They had known about Sauron, of course. Even disregarding the rather dramatic way Sauron`s resurgence had manifested itself in form of Celebrimbor`s death here in the halls, the elves who died from his invasion and the war that followed would have given them more than enough news. The knowledge that Gil-galad`s alliance – how far their child had come – with the men under a distant descendant of Turgon was winning the war against the biggest blight of Endor save for Morgoth himself had rekindled hope in the fëar of many children of the House of Finwë. Even Celegorm had looked viciously pleased.

So when Ranië dropped with a pain she had not felt since her death nearly an age prior, it came as a surprise to everybody. The only saving grace she had later was that at least she didn’t need to suffer for as long as Celumenna had. Her son`s death at the hand of Sauron was merciless and brutal, but at least quick.

She reunites with everybody else in the arrival hall. Findecano`s fëa flickers with still lingering pain and grief and the others feel muted too, but not distant. Grief had always been excellent in bringing them together.

It does not take long for Gil-galad to arrive. His fëa still wears an armour he must have worn at his death but at least she cannot see the wounds Sauron had left on his body like the tears and gashes that had marred Celebrimbor`s fëa. Her son stands before the judge and in that moment looks so much like his father it hurts. The next moment, she realises exactly why her son was here and feels a lot more sympathy towards Celumenna when she tried to tear Namo apart after her son`s death.

As if she sensed Ranië`s thoughts, Celumenna reaches through their bond. “Stay with me, please.” She can see Maedhros do something similar to Fingon on her side, and she searches comfort in her family around her. They might be crazy sometimes, but they all understand loss far better than anybody else.

Seeing her son stand in Mandos` Halls when he was meant to live a long life in Endor, free from the shadow, makes her heart hurt. The grief from everybody around her certainly does not help. Gil-galad was nearly the last of their house still left. Now it is only little Elrond and of course Artanis who still dwell in Endor.

Children of Finwë don’t get a happy ending.

She is not sure if it was her or Fingon who said it, but it is true. Nobody in their house had the life in paradise the Valar had once promised them. Ranië would not have been sad if she had to never experience the loss, the pain, the grief, the hopelessness they endured in Endor.

But they did, another voice in her fëa whispers. We did. And we survived. And maybe we do not get a happy ending, but who says the story ends here?

So she straightens her back and walks towards the fëa still kneeling before Namo.

“Gil-galad? It has been a long time since we last met.”

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