Summary: Faramir sees little, Boromir more, and Denethor will not look at her at all.
Pairings: Denethor x Finduilas
Author's Note: Another Finduilas-centric oneshot. I've decided I like this character.
Disclaimer: I don't own Lord of the Rings.
Faramir knows more than he lets on, and somehow less as well. His eyes, as sea gray as hers, seem to look straight past Finduilas, but at other points, he is know longer an all-seeing spirit but only a small child who knows that his mother is sick, but nothing more than that. He winces when she coughs, feeling her tremors from his perch on her lap, and asks her when she's going to get better.
Finduilas never answers, and runs a hand down his spine, trying as much to give solace to herself as to Faramir.
Still, despite his constant inquiries if being around her when she is ill will make him ill as well, Faramir tries to carry on as though nothing is wrong. He grasps his mother's hand as he tries to show her something he's found on the grounds of the citadel—an odd leaf or a brightly colorful feather—never straying too far from Finduilas's presence; Faramir is one of those children content to stay in his mother's shadow, and unless driven by curiosity doesn't run off from her.
Finduilas can not help but notice the cold everywhere as they slip into the library. It is early summer, but she is always cold now, feeling the chill bite her bones and freeze her blood, so that Finduilas would not be surprised to look out a casement and see snow falling.
The library is deserted as usual; the time when people come searching for books is typically evening, not morning, but Faramir's evenings are short thanks to his age and inclination towards tiring out early, so morning is the time for them to come.
His reading is quite proficient for his age. Finduilas can not help but notice that Faramir's passion for reading far outdoes his brother's; Boromir is twice Faramir's age and prefers to spend his time in instruction of swordplay and archery, already though Finduilas doubts that her older son, though he be tall and strong for his age, could even lift the sword given to a grown man. It is easy to see where their inclinations lie.
Finduilas has to restrain Faramir from selecting the sort of books that are far beyond his capacity. In the end, she manages to get him to accept a thin book of myths and legends, and sits at the same table as him as he opens the tome, and sets his mind to the task at hand.
Worrying with her teeth at her lip, Finduilas stares with the sort of intensity not suited for a mother gazing upon her child, at the top of Faramir's head. There is regret now, bitter regret for things she could never change and will never be able to change now. Fearing that his father will not, Finduilas hopes that Boromir, at least, will always take care of his brother.
Finduilas feels the cold pierce her skin, and wishes briefly that there could be fires lit in the library, though it is summer and the books here are dry and old and could easily catch fire.
Faramir, again, winces when the cough, rising from deep within her chest and sounding as though it robs her of all her strength, reverberates in the air, but he pretends not to notice as he continues to pore over the book, silently mouthing out the words and tugging on his mother's sleeve if he comes across one he does not understand.
Their days go down like this, and the only acknowledgement Faramir gives that he knows his mother is ill is his worried, knowing-and-yet-ignorant stares when he thinks Finduilas isn't watching, and the inquiries.
"Mama, when will you be better?"
.x.X.x.
Boromir sees better, and his greater experience allows his mind to run to wild—and not so wild—speculation, and fear that makes him start to pull away, just a little bit, from his mother. He can catch glimpses of the shadow over her and fears it.
He was never really her child anyway, Finduilas reflects bitterly, and she had never given him a chance to be hers.
But in a way, Boromir seems to want her attention more now than he ever did in the past, when she wasn't cold and she wasn't coughing. There's an odd desperation to his eyes, slate gray like his father's, as he takes her hand and wants to show her his progress in matters of the sword and archery and history and mathematics and so on.
Boromir has never been the child with one hand attached to his mother's skirt; he has never been content to stay at her side. This is why Finduilas feels some spark and stab in her when he starts to seek her out more, why it gives her pain when Boromir stares up at his mother with that keen longing lodged in his eyes. It is not natural; he would not behave this way, if…
Finduilas is happy to indulge him, perhaps a little guilty; Faramir accompanies them often, happy to be in the company of the two people with whom he is most comfortable.
The brothers play happily together despite their different ages and temperaments, and Finduilas is content to watch them from nearby, having to be sure that they are safe and that Boromir does not play too roughly for his much smaller brother.
Even under the light of the strong and kind summer sun, Finduilas is still stabbed and rent by cold and coughs. Her thin, slender shoulders, the flesh melted away just slightly by illness, threaten to quake from the chill bite she feels in the air, but Finduilas forces herself to stand straight and firm in front of her children. They do not deserve to see their mother brought low to this.
Faramir is absorbed by activity to the point that he barely seems to remember that his mother is there, but Boromir is all too aware of her presence, his eyes flicking back to her at every opportunity, wary and nervous and miserable. As though he expects her to collapse at any second.
He's just waiting for the moment when she will fall.
Finduilas continues to watch, eyes as gray as the sea she still misses so much fixing on her children, trying to shore up the moments now because they will never come for her again. This much, she can sense in her frozen bones. And Boromir seems to be able to tell as well, growing more solicitous and less coltishly independent by each passing day.
Finally, a day comes when they are alone and Faramir is not with them, and Finduilas, with difficulty and her knees trembling slightly, kneels down on her knees on the stone floor of the deserted hall. Golden light filters at intervals through the tall, narrow windows, but all else is in shadow. Boromir stands in a shaft of light and Finduilas kneels in the shadows, her hands heavy on his shoulders.
The promise she extracts from him is a simple one.
"Promise me, Boromir, that you will always look after yourself. And your brother."
"I promise, Mother."
For she will not be able to manage it herself.
Finduilas gently rubs his cheek, only to feel him flinch, and she wonders when Boromir outgrew such things and began to call her 'Mother', instead of 'Mama'.
.x.X.x.
Denethor sees most of all, and yet is blind to the things Finduilas wants him to see. She often wonders now if, had she been able to fully express to Denethor how much she has missed the sea and how her dreams have taken her soaring above the air until she sees the water once more, if things would have been different than how they are now. If they could have just left from the shadow of the East, maybe not forever, but just once every so often, so Finduilas would not have to watch the ugly orange light rising over the mountains in the East.
However, there is no use in pondering what has not been said, for Finduilas knows that Denethor listens not to her words now, blinded and deafened by his own grief that even before she is gone threatens to drown them both. Denethor, who has seen death written plainly on her face, can not bring himself to look again.
He does love her. Finduilas knows that, for all that he is reserved and taciturn and undemonstrative, Denethor loves her as much as he has ever loved anyone. But when the shadow of death falls, his heart grows horrified as hers does at the sight of Mordor, and Denethor turns his eyes away in such a way that Finduilas has never been able to manage.
"Look at me," she insists. "Look at me!" Finduilas holds up her hands to the light so he can see them—pale, ivory-white, translucent with the blue veins growing more and more visible by each day. The pale light of a gray morning seems to shine straight through the flesh and the bones of these long, almost corpse-like hands.
Denethor will not.
Finduilas begins to suspect that he can not.
Can not bring himself to look at her when she begins to waste away, wilt like a delicate coastal flower left on the hard, sun-baked stone—because that is what she is, and Denethor is just beginning to see that and grieves at his own ignorance.
He does not wish to remember her like this.
But Finduilas wants him to look at her, see her, know her, once more.
For Finduilas suspects that if Denethor does not look at her, see her one last time with the slate gray eyes that see more than their children ever could, he will not remember her at all.
It is cold now.
She reaches for his hand, to warm hers.
And for once, Denethor runs his much larger fingers over her knuckles, trying to chafe warmth back into those clammy hands, endeavoring desperately to remember her the way she was, before illness settled in her bones.
But he still will not look at her.