#Fëanor being a pest

[myfavouritelunatic]

Penumbra - Chapter Five

“How is it that you have the power to give me the one thing I seek… above all else? I doubt very much that Artanis and I would have this chance if not for you specifically, Mairon.” There it was again, creeping in, buzzing about his head like a pest. Jealousy. If there was one thing Mairon did not have in his endless existence, it was someone to share it with. Someone to ignite the spark within his own heart, to give him meaning, to grant him more than what he’d already accomplished. And he had accomplished much, being a part of the Music, and serving Aulë like no one else. He knew it was why Melkor had seduced him so easily. That vala was the first one to show him true appreciation. If Mairon had mistaken it for love, it was not his fault. It was the one thing he yearned for most. He was so willing to see it where it did not exist. But during his time here, with Fëanor, with Artanis… he had glimpsed different kinds of love. The all consuming and possessive kind the elf lord holds for his niece, and the sweet idolatry of a young elf with innocence begging to be exploited. And oh had he exploited it.

Word Count: 4.9k

Warnings: Not really any smut this chapter, lots of passionate kissing however hehe. 😘

Massive thanks as always for @klynnvakarian 's incredible artwork here!! 🥰

I really like this chapter and I hope you all do too! 🖤

[thelordofgifs]

a snippet, something angsty and something cracky!

(WIP ask game)

❄️Share a snippet from a WIP of your choosing.

Here is some of the ghastly mess I produced yesterday after being compelled by the will of the people to work on the "Maedhros doesn't swear the Oath" AU:

Fëanor says nothing to Maedhros – but his burning eyes, as they land on Maedhros, leave him shivering. In the next moment he is accosted by Fingolfin and all his fury is turned towards his half-brother; and Finarfin is pleading for peace and Turgon is nodding along to his father’s words and Angrod and Aegnor are being sharply reprimanded by Finrod their brother. It is the type of situation that Maedhros would normally be in the middle of, trying to calm his father whilst agreeing with him, to placate Fingolfin without appearing to, to end his cousins’ quarrelling with a single glance; but he is still standing frozen in the centre of the square, the magnitude of what he has done – what he has not done – pressing the air from his lungs; and Fingolfin gestures at him as he shouts at his brother, saying, “Thy own son will not partake in thy folly—”

what are these SENTENCES send HELP.

🌧️Share something angsty from your WIP.

Here's a little snippet from The Unburied, the longfic I will probably get back to at some point:

There were tears pricking at Maglor’s eyes. There would be no shame in letting them fall: Maedhros would not rebuke him, merely brush them tenderly away. But he had been holding back for too many long weeks of disaster to weep now. Managing to keep his voice steady, he said, “Then don’t go, don’t leave me—” “Káno,” Maedhros breathed. “You have been so very brave. Can you not keep at it just a little longer?” They had stood on the beach at Losgar, numb with shock, and Amras had crumbled and Celegorm’s face had gone sick and pale; and Maglor had hidden his shaking hands and asked himself, What will break you? And again, as their father’s body had gone up in flames, when Maedhros had cried out and unsentimental Curufin had fallen to his knees and wept, Maglor had put together a hurried lament, and led his stunned and grieving brothers back to the camp on the shores of Lake Mithrim, and kept his head. What will break you? he had wondered, but he knew the answer. So did Maedhros.

🌩️ Share something funny/cracky from your WIP.

I'm not sure I ever really do cracky as such, but here's something vaguely funny, from Ilimbë - tiny!Fëanor being a pest:

Finwë smiled. “The story does not say,” he said. “Perhaps he had none.” Fëanor was not much impressed. “All the Eldar have names,” he said. “I stand corrected!” said Finwë, with a laugh. “He had a name, then, but it is lost to us now. May I continue with the story, please?” “All right,” Fëanor had said, as graciously as he could manage. He did like his father’s bedtime stories, after all.

[i-did-not-mean-to]

A for effort for dear Námo

This is for all the people who made me really like Námo, like @maglor-my-beloved, @z-h-i-e, and of course, my Valar-liking friend @the-red-butterfly.

Please enjoy 715 words of Námo having a less-than-ideal day with his wife.

(Also...Fëanor, because always Fëanor)

“I do not look that grim,” Fëanáro bellowed, looking – as far as Námo was concerned – much dourer than his beloved wife had ever depicted him in any of her tapestries.

“Is it too much to ask that she not slander me more than strictly necessary? Already, you lot seem to have decided to turn me into the villain of your little tale of woe; do you absolutely have to make me look like one in every hanging as well?” The wavering soul sniffed in vexation. “My children see this as well, and my poor mother has to weave these atrocities! Who designs those abhorrent pictures?”

Námo steadied himself, trying hard to remember the breathing exercises his beloved siblings had shown him to deal with the stress of his workplace; these new-fangled ideas brought to their realm by the returning exiles and odd guests alike did have their undeniable advantages, he had to admit.

“I shall have words with my wife,” he declared placatingly, but a tight knot of apprehension started swirling deep within his core. As was custom, he did not meddle in Vairë’s work and she kept mostly out of his.

It would take incredible tact and quite a bit of sweet-talking to get her to understand that one of his charges – and she’d know which one right away – had complained about her handiwork. There was a distinct risk that she’d take the broom she used to tidy up the bits of discarded and cut-off thread in her halls and sweep Finwë’s oldest and Míriel’s only son straight into the void.

Tired of Fëanáro’s antics, Námo removed himself with as much grace as he could muster and went straight to his beloved wife’s halls where she sat, frowning and weighing a few spools of thread pensively, in front of a half-finished tapestry of a particularly bloody battle.

“Husband,” she greeted without turning around. “What say you? This one or this one for the blood?” She held aloft two reels that looked to be the exact same shade of crimson to Námo.

“That one,” he replied and tapped the one closest to him. “I’ve come to transmit the grievance of one of my charges.”

As she whirled around, he steeled himself against the inquisitive touch of her mind, brushing against his own with tender confidence. “Oh?” Vairë cocked her head.

“Someone expressed moderate displeasure about the way they’re shown.” He cleared his throat sheepishly as her brows drew together in dismay. “That someone,” he went on bravely, “thinks that their beauty might not be rendered satisfactorily by your impeccable art.”

“Oh, she said that he’d complain,” Vairë grunted and threw the bobbins to the stone floor to clasp her hands around her knees in an expression of benevolent patience. “And you’ve come to impart that questionable insight right away?”

“Indeed,” Námo sighed; he saw his wife’s eyes darken and her glance flit over the rows of neatly arrayed spools that turned one wall of her halls into a mesmerising mosaic of colours. 

“Leave it to me, husband,” she then said in a tone so sweet and soothing that he was now convinced beyond a doubt that she was indeed plotting to teach the unruliest of the High Kings of the Noldor a lesson.

“I submit to your wisdom and skill,” he replied hastily lest he be entangled in marital doom amongst other shenanigans. “Far be it from me to lecture you on your own unique gift.”

With those conciliatory words, Námo returned to his own tasks, happy to have handled things so well.

The very next day, Fëanáro – flashing red and orange with anger – came to him and led him to the newest addition to the hanging decorating every wall, courtesy of his esteemed spouse.

“Oh,” Námo gasped and fell silent. Vairë had indeed made Míriel’s son blindingly handsome, but – on the other hand – he was now tiny, dwarfed and overshadowed by his children and siblings. “Well, you’ve never said anything about your height.”

Smug as a cat that had gotten to the cream, he drifted away and left his very animate ball and chain standing in front of the offending tapestry, fuming and raging. 

At the very least, Námo thought, Fëanáro was much restored and almost his old self again…for better or for worse.

That's it...that's the burst of energy for today lol

Lots of love!

[elesianne]

A Silmarillion fanfic, chapter twenty-three

Chapter summary: A long summer is spent with Tuilindien’s family.

Rating: Teen and up audiences; Chapter length: ~4,400 words

Chapter notes: After a ten-month break I am finally able to post a new chapter full of love and fluff, and to announce that I have all of this fic written now! So no more long breaks. There will be two chapters after this one, and I intend to post them both about a week apart.

Tuilindien uses modern phonological terminology from our world in this chapter. No doubt Tolkien’s language-loving elves had their own words for things such as phonemes, but as I don’t know those, I ‘borrowed’ from our world. The differences in the speech of Fëanáro, other Noldor, and the Vanyar are discussed in the Shibboleth of Fëanor.

As you may remember, vanimelda, 'beautiful beloved’ or 'beloved Vanya’, is Carnistir’s favoured endearment for Tuilindien. Fëa = spirit, hröa = body.

(Read on AO3)

*

Chapter XXIII // A summer on the plains

Next summer on Taniquetil  

'Carnistir! You’re finally here.’ Tuilindien runs into his arms as soon as he dismounts. Varnerocco snorts and stomps beside them, startled, and that is the only reason Carnistir doesn’t swing Tuilindien in his arms right now and keep her there.

Instead he embraces her quickly and kisses her quicker before telling her, 'I need to stable this impatient creature, Tuilë, and then I will show you how much I missed you too.’

Tuilindien giggles as she shows him to the stall reserved for Varnë. 'It was a long winter’, she agrees. 'I am glad that you could come here for the summer. If you didn’t come, I would probably just have hopped on my horse one day and ridden to Tirion without even packing anything.’

They smile at each other over Varnë’s broad back.

'Snowdrop was around just a moment ago but he slipped off somewhere’, Tuilindien chatters as she helps Carnistir brush down Varnë’s sweat-damp coat and shows him where the tack room and feed are. 'Lirulinë and Alcarno are gone too, have been for a week – they went to my grandparents’ estate early as Lirulinë was beginning to feel tired and wanted to have the travelling done with before the last weeks of her pregnancy. Cirincë has been expecting you, though.’

'She has?’ Carnistir is a little alarmed by that.

'She has made a drawing she wants to gift to you. She has turned out to be much more lastingly interested in art than we thought she would be. It might be her vocation.’

Carnistir has to keep pushing Varnë’s head away when she tries to come eat her oats before Carnistir is done measuring them into the manger.

'And why has she done a drawing for me?’ he asks once that struggle is over.

Tuilindien smiles at the question. 'Cirincë has been gifting her drawings to everyone in the family. You are the only one who has not received one yet.’

'Oh.’ It must be a good thing, then. To be included among family by Tuilindien’s little sister. 'What is the drawing of?’

Tuilindien blushes. 'Me.’

'That might also be the reason for her wanting to give to me.’ Carnistir pats Varnë on the rump as a goodbye, dodges the half-hearted kick she gives him in return, and gets out of the stall to finally embrace Tuilindien like he wants to. She melts in his arms.

'You grow ever more sweet every time I see you’, he mumbles into her hair. He likes that she has it down, unstyled, and he likes the simple dress she wears, with its wide sash and light teal colour.

'You have cut your hair’, Tuilindien says as she runs her fingers through the shoulder-length windswept mess of it. The ribbon holding back had flown off somewhere on the mountain path.

'It was getting too long.’ He doesn’t like it when it grows long enough to cover his shoulder blades. There is something unpleasant about that sensation.

Tuilindien sighs happily. 'I am so glad that you are here for the whole summer, Carnistir. It would be very difficult to give you up soon.’

'As long as I don’t receive word that Curufinwë and Findaráto have collapsed our house, I am not giving you up before the harvest festival.’

Tuilindien pulls back from his arms. 'Findaráto? What does he have to do with the house?’

Carnistir wants to smack himself. 'I didn’t tell you about that in my letters, did I.’

'No.’ Tuilindien takes his arm and leads him out of the stables. 'You can tell me all about it over food and wine. You must be hungry and thirsty after the long journey.’

'There is not so much to tell.’ Carnistir is tired of everyone making such a fuss about him doing something together with Findaráto. He tries not to speak too testily to Tuilindien, though. 'He heard that I was building a house and he came to the worksite and asked me if he could participate in the work’, he summarises for her.

'That may be what happened, but there must be more in the background of it all.’ Tuilindien opens the door of her family’s house and leads him inside. Spotting a maidservant, she orders for wine and a hearty snack to be brought into a sitting room.

'Dinner will be soon’, she tells him as they make their way to the sitting room. As in most rooms of Tuilindien’s home, the stained glass windows throw colourful shadows on the floor, but they are situated so that people sitting around the low table at the end of the room are spared from being thus colourised.

Carnistir studies the window while he tells Tuilindien, 'Findaráto had heard that I’d designed a house with both Noldorin and Vanyarin influences and that intrigued him, he told me, because of his own mixed heritage. He is working towards mastery in stonemasonry and needs to gather more experience but Tirion, you know, is already very built up and there are not many completely new buildings being built. That added to his interest in our house, I believe.’

Carnistir huffs. 'Or perhaps not. He did not tell me that. Perhaps he approached me more because of our kinship. He is strange enough that he might think it a desirable thing to work with his cousin even if that cousin has never liked and has never masked it very well.’

'Yet the cousin agreed to work with him?’

'Well, he works for me. I have more experience with building design and construction and stonemasonry – he has spent much time with his mother’s kin, learning their trades.’

'I see’, Tuilindien says, though it seems like she doesn’t, not quite.

Carnistir is thankful that Tuilindien doesn’t pry more about why he took Findaráto on. Everyone else has, and he is tired of giving explanations.

It doesn’t seem to be enough to try to get along with people; it seems he must tolerate fussing and teasing about it as well.

'He works hard and learns fast’, Carnistir says. It is not an explanation for his actions, just an observation he hasn’t shared with anyone before.

'And how does Curufinwë get along with him?’

Carnistir cannot help but snicker. 'Very badly. Curufinwë has only stayed on because he is too stubborn to give up because of 'that blond pest’, as he calls Findaráto.’

A smile tugs at the corner of Tuilindien’s mouth. 'I hope they won’t collapse the house by some disagreement.’

Carnistir laughs. 'They both are too proud and ambitious for that, luckily. And the foundations are ready already, and they are strong.’

*

They spend a week in Tuilindien’s home on Taniquetil. Carnistir is given a bedroom on the other side of the house. He isn’t certain whether he should be insulted by that. On one hand, it might be Tuilindien’s parents’ way of telling him that there is to be no sneaking from bedroom to bedroom at night. On the other, it is a very nice, large guest room, possibly the best in the house.

When they ride for Tuilindien’s grandparents’ estate on the plains, the whole household goes with them, servants included.

Cirincë rides the whole way on her own small horse for the first time ever. She wants to ride between Tuilindien and Carnistir and to point out to Carnistir all the 'sights’ that they pass.

Once they settle in the house that is too large to be called a farmhouse but has the warm ambience and unpretentiousness of one, Carnistir finds himself, for the first time in his adult life, completely at leisure.

Tuilindien’s family has no expectations for him, no work to do. He doesn’t have anything that he needs to study, or to plan, apart from correspondence. He worked hard, all his waking hours, all winter, either supervising work at the house or taking part in the physical work himself. If he wasn’t at the worksite, he was negotiating with tradesmen and suppliers or redrawing plans as issues in the original plans became apparent.

It had been the idea that by spending the summer with Tuilindien at her family’s farm, Curufinwë and Findaráto overseeing the continuing building work of his house, Carnistir would be able to rest.

But Carnistir finds that he rested enough already on Taniquetil, and after a few lazy, golden days on the estate, he is dreading the idea of many more weeks of them.

He has gone on walks with Tuilindien. He has gone riding with her. He has been shown very thoroughly around the vineyard, including the facilities and equipment used for making wine which he found very interesting. He has dined formally with the whole family, and on a blanket in the garden with Tuilindien and her little sisters. He has even written home to his mother, Maitimo, Makalaurë and Ambarussar, as well as Curufinwë and Findaráto for work reasons.

He has laid wholly awake at night because there is so much energy left in his body that he cannot slip to Lórien’s realm.

'I need to do something’, he tells Tuilindien in the morning after that night. They are having a private breakfast in the garden.

Tuilindien looks confused. 'What do you need to do?’ she asks.

'Anything. I am… It was very generous of your family to offer to host me for the whole summer just to have me lazing around and eating your food –’

'You are family too’, Tuilindien insists.

He takes her right hand and kisses the finger that holds his ring. 'In spite of that, it doesn’t feel right not to do anything. You’re helping your grandparents with the vineyard’s bookkeeping, and you work on your new treatise every night. And I need to do something for my own sake, too. I am getting restless in all senses of the word.’

Tuilindien’s smile over the rim of her teacup is gentle and understanding as she sips. 'What sorts of things would you like to do, Carnistir?’

'I noticed that the side door of the winery sticks a little. If no one has done anything about it yet, I can fix it, if I get tools somewhere, and do other similar things too. I can give Cirincë riding lessons to improve her seat. I want to learn more about winemaking – if I could follow your foreman around for a day or two…’

'There is not much being done this early in the summer besides trimming the vines. You will find harvest-time more interesting’, Tuilindien says. 'We can ask the foreman about it, though, and whether he can think of more work for you to do, if you truly want to work even though you don’t have to.’

Carnistir grins. 'I would much rather roll up my sleeves and get my hands dirty with physical work than laze around here, or go back to my grandfather’s court and stand or sit around all day just talking and listening and at best writing things down.’

'Very well then’, Tuilindien smiles. 'My family might be bewildered, but there is certainly work here that you and your strong hands can do.’

She blushes when she mentions his hands, and it is delightful to Carnistir.

*

Carnistir finds the vineyard’s foreman a very sensible person who, after looking Carnistir up and down and apparently coming to some favourable conclusion, gives him work to do every time he asks for it. He does some basic tasks such as fixing the door that require little thinking, and he learns some new skills specific to a vineyard.

He writes a letter about it to his father.

Together with Tuilindien he instructs Cirincë in improving her riding and finds her an eager pupil, if not as exuberant as his little twin brothers.

He still spends time with Tuilindien, too, many hours every day when just the two of them do not much of anything together. He enjoys those quiet hours all the more when they are balanced by mornings spent at work.

Tuilindien takes him often, by foot or on horse, to those places where the rolling plains offer a beautiful, unobstructed view of the Two Trees.

Often they sit under a tree for hours, dreaming with or without words of the future or simply enjoying the closeness of the moment, one of them petting the other’s hair.

'You are going to miss them, aren’t you?’ He asks her one day. 'The Trees. Having them so close and so bright.’

'I am.’ Tuilindien, resting against his chest with her gaze on the Trees, sighs. 'I cannot help it. I love their light this close and though Tirion is beautiful and its brilliant whiteness makes it glow with a light of its own, almost, it is not…’

'It is not the same.’

'It is not the light of my childhood.’ She turns around in his lap and puts her hands in his hair. 'I have left childhood behind, though, and leaving my people who live close to the Trees is another new phase in my life. Do not feel sad for me, Carnistir.’

'But –’

She silences him with a kiss. She knows by now just how to kiss so that he can do nothing but put his arms around her and hold her tight, kiss back, nibble on her lower lip to make her make one of her delightful little noises.

At a certain point they stop kissing, as they must always do until they marry one another. Tuilindien says, 'Your kisses have melted me’, and stays in his lap, head tucked against his shoulder. Her breath tickles in his hair.

She mumbles something into his tunic some time later. It is amusing but incomprehensible.

’Vanimelda, you must lift your head if you wish to speak.’

'Must I?’ Tuilindien gets off him just to lay down with her head in his lap instead. She looks up at him.

'I have been thinking’, she says.

To him, that seems an ominous beginning, especially coupled with the faint sense of anxiety he feels from her. 'Of what?’ he asks.

'I think I shall speak like your family, when we are wedded. Noldorin – the kind of Noldorin that your parents and your brothers speak.’

'My mother speaks otherwise when she is in the company of her own family only’, Carnistir points out.

'Otherwise regarding the merging of the voiceless dental fricative with the voiceless alveolar sibilant?

'Or as my father calls it, sá-siing. Yes.’

'Like your wise mother, I intend continue to speak with my family the way I have always spoken, too. But when I am in Tirion, I will speak the way that your father's… convictions have made your family to speak. Not because of your father’, Tuilindien stresses. 'Because of you. Because it is the way you speak.’

He cups the side of her face. 'If you have made the decision, why do you feel anxiety? Do you doubt it?’

'I do not doubt my decision.’ She turns her hand towards his hand, and closes her eyes. When she continues, it is in perfect Noldorin – and so similar, both in the speech sounds and in rhythm and intonation to the way Carnistir knows himself to speak that it is eerie.

'I am aware, though, that it will place me on the side of the minority among the Noldor, and across the divide from the kind and queen, who have recently adopted the change. It seems to me… awkward to make a choice which sets me apart from most of the people I am joining by marriage, particularly Finwë and Indis who have been so kind to me. But since the marriage is to you, I shall speak as you do.’

How can he reply to that but by bending down to kiss her?

It turns out that sideways, upside-down kissing is awkward too. It makes Tuilindien laugh and get up and straddle his lap again. It is their favourite position to kiss; their whole bodies close together, her face just a bit above his, making it easy to close the distance. Her long hair, when it is free, forms a soft golden curtain around them both.

He kisses her until he can feel the last of her apprehensiveness swept away in a sweet current of better emotions.

*

One hot, hazy day late in the summer Lirulinë has her baby, a little daughter. Carnistir gets to see her together with Tuilindien when the baby is only a few hours old. He has never seen a child so young, not even the Curufinwë or Ambarussar, for his mother was very exhausted after those births and Fëanáro stayed in their room alone with her and the babies for a whole day.

Lirulinë’s daughter has the same green-blue eyes as her mother and her aunt Tuilindien. Carnistir stands behind Tuilindien’s shoulder as she holds her, marvelling at the new life grasping onto Tuilindien’s finger.

It is far too easy to imagine that one day there might a child that looks much like this child with her eyes like Tuilindien’s and curly hair close in colour to hers, and that she or he might be theirs, theirs to love and to hold. Though, Carnistir thinks when a dash of sense returns to him, their child will most likely have hair much darker than this.

Though he hopes they will have golden-haired children too, against the odds.

'She is very beautiful and strong, Lirulinë’, Tuilindien says when she carefully hands the newborn back to its mother. 'I am very glad that I was able to be here to welcome her.’

Lirulinë just smiles in reply, settling the baby’s blanket better around her.

'We are calling her Aiwië for now’, Alcarno says from his place beside Lirulinë, beaming proudly.

'You named her 'little bird’ in honour of our family’s tradition?’ Tuilindien asks, clearly delighted.

'She is sweet like a fluffy little bird’, Alcarno says. 'It seemed a good way to name her after her mother.’

Lirulinë leans against the headboard and her husband for support, but seems to be in good spirits. 'It will be my role to give her a name that she will not be embarrassed by when she is a grown woman’, she says wryly, but her shrewd eyes are softer than Carnistir has ever seen them.

'It is a lovely father-name, and a lovely tribute to our family.’ Tuilindien goes to kiss Lirulinë’s cheek and the baby’s forehead and Alcarno’s cheek as well.

Carnistir is not jealous as he once would have been. This is a very special moment, even he can feel that, and he has come to know Alcarno and the relationship he has with Tuilindien. They have been friends their whole lives, and brother and sister by marriage for many years.

'Thank you for letting me see the baby’, he says to Lirulinë and Alcarno before he and Tuilindien leave to let them rest and become acquainted with each other. 'She is beautiful.’

Which is what Tuilindien said already, but how else could he describe something so wonderful as a brand new fëa and hröa, a dearly-wished-for child born to a loving family.

In the corridor outside Lirulinë’s bedroom Carnistir can only say 'I hope –’

And Tuilindien says, 'I know, my love, so do I. We will – in time, if we are blessed.’

They go for a long walk in the orchard at the back of the garden, hand in hand, in silence, among the scent of the ripening fruit and the sounds of busy insects and birds.

 *

When the summer draws to its end and the time for harvest arrives, Carnistir seems eager to take part in the work and learn more about winemaking.

'Do you want to learn more about everything that happens, or is there something about winemaking that has especially caught your interest?’ Tuilindien asks him early one morning when she kisses his cheek before he goes to join the pickers for the day.

Carnistir takes a moment to think. 'My father taught me to be interested in how things work, or how they are made’, he says. 'I never had much cause before to think about how grapes are turned into wine, but being here in a vineyard for weeks has made me think about it, and now I want to learn.’

'Well, my grandparents told me that they are very happy that you find their vineyard interesting.’ Tuilindien smiles. 'I will see you at lunch.’

'I like you in work clothes like this’, he says, sweeping his hand down the side of her old cotton dress. 'Even though you have to keep your hair hidden away.’

Tuilindien touches the kerchief she has tied around her head, her long hair carefully tucked inside it. 'It wouldn’t do to have my hairs mixed in with the grapes when I’m sorting them.’

They sneak in another kiss before going their separate ways to the morning’s work. Every adult on the estate takes part in the work during the rush of harvest-time, and older children help, too. They are busy days, but happy too, with jesting and singing making the work hours go faster.

Once most of the work is done for the harvest of the early varieties of grape, Tuilindien’s family as well as most of the estate’s workers leave as a great procession for the Holy Mountain, Taniquetil, for it is time for the harvest festival.

This time, Tuilindien and Carnistir celebrate the festival in the usual manner, if less exuberantly than some. Carnistir refuses to sing where there are strangers to hear it, and he only dances with Tuilindien – and with Cirincë, for she asks him to, and he seems unable to deny her anything.

Tuilindien loves him all the more for it.

They spend the festival with their families. Fëanáro has not come, as usual, but everyone else has. Tyelkormo asks Tuilindien to dance, for which Carnistir glares at him, but Tuilindien agrees because she wants to get to know all of Carnistir’s brothers better.

She doesn’t make much progress with that, though, because the dance Tyelkormo chooses is fast and lively and offers little chance for talking.

Maitimo approaches her next, asking her to join him, Makalaurë and Tinweriel in a dance requiring four dance partners. Tuilindien accepts gracefully though she is nervous that her dancing will fall short of the others’ grace.

All three are pleasant, genial company though, and Tuilindien is all smiles when she returns to Carnistir.

'Do you think Curufinwë will appear to dance with me next?’ she asks him, laughing. Her head spins from dancing and from the wine that is so readily available at this feast. She tries to fix the placement of her veil on her hair, but only makes it worse.

'Almost certainly not.’ Carnistir’s more steady fingers straighten the circlet and veil both, caressing the back of her neck as he tucks her hair under the silvery fabric.

'That may be for the best. I am becoming rather silly. Dance with me again, darling, please.’ She twines her hands around his neck and pulls him close.

'Right here by the food?’ he asks dryly. 'Let us go somewhere more private and I’ll dance with you in a way that my brothers certainly didn't…’

Tuilindien laughs in his ear.

*

The next day is the long-dreaded day of farewell. Tuilindien tries to make it a little less difficult for Carnistir by giving him something that will keep him preoccupied.

'I think this might be the best gift I have ever given you, though it is not a difficult comparison to win’, she says as she gives him the wicker basket that a serving maid just brought into the room.

He takes the basket. Small, pitiable mews can be heard from the inside and understandably Carnistir does not look very surprised when upon opening the lid he finds a kitten inside.

He looks delighted, though.

The kitten is jet black and has yellow, almost orange eyes, and she also has very many opinions about having been shut in a basket, for however short a time, which she expresses by continued mewing.

She quietens when Carnistir carefully lifts it out of the basket and into his lap. She sniffs the air instead and inspects his tunic by mouthing at it.

'She is old enough for you to take to Tirion with you. If you wish to, that is. You wrote to me in one of your letters that you wanted to have a cat once you settle down in your own home. That home is not yet fully built but I thought that you could use this little creature’s company while you finish it. Her mother is a stable cat and a famous mouser –’

Carnistir interrupts her by taking her hand though he has to let go of it again when the kitten tries to make an escape since she is no longer encircled by his hands. He pulls her back to the safety of his lap.

'Tuilë, she is a great gift. Where did she come from?’

'Our neighbour. I talked with her before we left for the plains for the summer and asked for one of the kittens her family’s stable cat was going to have. I fetched the kitten from her just this morning.’

'She is a gift long in planning, then.’ Carnistir smiles.

'She is, though I did not plan her to be black. I want you to know that. It just happened that every kitten in the litter is black, though only one of the parents is.’

Carnistir shrugs. 'Black is as good a colour as any other.’

'It is not because your hair is black’, Tuilindien stresses.

Carnistir bursts out in laughter. 'I didn’t think about that for a second.’

'My mother saw the kitten when I brought her over from our neighbour, and she asked me whether I intended on colour-matching all my gifts to your hair’, Tuilindien confesses.

The kitten startles at how hard Carnistir shakes with laughter at that. 'Feel free to do so if you wish, Tuilë, for I might not even notice.’

'I don’t wish to do it’, Tuilindien grumbles, but she moves to sit right next to Carnistir and lays her head on his shoulder, looking on while he gets acquainted with his new pet.

*

A/N: In the next chapter, preparations for the future continue.

I love everyone who is still reading this