I own nothing.

"Lady Nerdanel? My Lady?"

Nerdanel has only been to the Halls of Vairë once in her life—not so long ago, in fact. She had heard whispers, never spoken to her face, that there were very specific tapestries hung in Vairë's domain, the sections of the Halls of Waiting where the living could still tread. Since such rumors tended to surface and cycle every few years, Nerdanel did not pay it much mind, until she heard exactly what the rumor-bearers were saying.

These tapestries were not being sewn by Vairë, but by an Elven handmaiden—not that anyone could ever give the name of this handmaiden, something Nerdanel counted as dubious. But as she listened on, certain details caught her attention.

This handmaiden had been tasked to record the deeds of Finwë and his descendants for the rest of time. And weave she did, but oddly prominent amongst her tapestries, beautifully woven and frighteningly lifelike, were the deeds, good and ill alike, of Fëanáro and his sons. If anything, she seemed to have something of a fixation on them, even if she did weave in the deeds of his other descendants as well.

At this, Nerdanel found her curiosity piqued. She had some free time on her hands and resolved to travel to Vairë's Halls, if only to see if the rumors themselves were true. Nerdanel told herself that she did not care for the pain that she would likely feel if all the rumors were true, and she was to find the scenes of her husband and sons' lives playing out before her eyes in thread. She already knew that her husband was dead. She already knew that most of her children were dead. She even knew the manners of their deaths. It seemed to Nerdanel that there was no more pain left to bleed, not within her.

After two weeks of traveling, Nerdanel reached the Halls. They were deserted, utterly bereft of either their lady or her handmaidens. Nerdanel wandered about in the Halls, staring at the tapestries that adorned the walls, looking for some sign of anyone about at all, for some sign that all the rumors she'd heard were true.

The weather outside was warm, and the light poured in through the high, vaulted windows, but the interior of Vairë's Halls was cool, even chilly, enough so that Nerdanel kept her cloak wound about her shoulders as she wandered down the corridors, occasionally calling out for anyone who might be lurking just out of sight.

And then, she saw them.

She recognized the Elves in the tapestries she saw. She saw Fëanáro and their sons, on the other side of the Sea, fighting, killing, dying. She saw them committing both good deeds and terrible, perpetrating terrible crimes and putting a stop to them, and her heart was pierced with pride and disappointment all at once. And she saw them dying.

It hurt more than Nerdanel thought it would.

Oh yes, Nerdanel had already known that her husband and the majority of their sons were dead. She'd heard the tale of their deaths, and even found anger to level against Fëanáro, for leaving their sons to finish what he had started, knowing as he must have where the Oath would lead them and how their searching for his thrice-damned Silmarils would end. But to see them…

There was Fëanáro, collapsing into ash and embers. There was Tyelkormo and the Doriathrin King Dior dying upon each other's swords. There was Carnistir and Atarinkë, dying on the Doriathrin spears. And the Ambarussa dying on those same spears, but in the Havens of Sirion (And well did I wish to name them Umbarto). And she saw something she did not expect. And she screamed.

There was Maitimo, in flames. He clutched one of his father's thrice-damned jewels to his chest, but it was dark now, and he was in flames. His hair was bursting with fire, his clothes disintegrating, his skin melting. There he was, in the last harrowing moment before merciful oblivion. Nerdanel collapsed against the opposite wall, and screamed and screamed again, unable to tear her eyes away from the sight of her oldest son as he was immolated. She screamed until her throat was so hoarse that she could make no sound at all.

"My Lady?" At last, Nerdanel looks away from the papers strewn out on the kitchen table when she feels a tentative hand upon her shoulder.

The visitor to her small house, framed by early morning light, is a tall Vanyarin nís with her hair in a tight braid. Her clothes are dusty with travel and they are, Nerdanel realizes, masculine clothes, cut in the style worn by the Vanyar who went over the Sea with the Host of Valinor, decades ago. Light blue tunic and brown trousers she wears, and calf-high brown boots; thick leather gloves are tucked into the nís's belt A bag hangs from one of her shoulders, and what looks like a lute is slung across her back. Even if she's unarmed, there's no mistaking her for anything but a soldier home from war.

It is somewhat difficult, but Nerdanel manages to draw a smile up to her face; there's something familiar about this nís, something she can't quite place, and that perhaps softens the blow of being confronted by someone in her house, who's apparently let themselves in uninvited. "I had thought that all of the Vanyar returned home when the war ended," she says, not really sure of anything else to say to the visitor; it really is too early in the morning to be entertaining strangers. Unbidden, the memory comes of the first wave of soldiers returning to the Undying Lands. A memory of herself, being told the fates of her two oldest sons, and responding that she already knew.

"Ah, no. I've tarried in Endóre these past four and a half years." A wide, almost roguish grin passes briefly over her broad, heart-shaped face. "I found I wanted to stay a little longer, and see what the land is like when at peace—or as close as it ever gets to being at peace, I suppose." She laughs ruefully, a bright laugh like bells ringing.

That laugh rings a bell, and Nerdanel realizes what it is about the nís that seems familiar to her. "Elemmírë?" she asks incredulously, recognizing her visitor as a musician friend and correspondent of old of Makalaurë's. Nerdanel takes another look at her braided hair and raises an eyebrow. "Goodness, but you look different, Elemmírë."

Elemmírë grins again. "Ah, you didn't recognize me, did you, my Lady? I don't suppose that many would." She runs a hand over her braid, freeing a strand of golden hair that immediately springs into a curl—and Nerdanel has to admit, it certainly is strange seeing Elemmírë without a cloud of frizzy, fly-away curls falling all over her face; she looks rather like a sculpture left unfinished, one highly important defining feature left missing. "Truth be told, I don't like it much myself," she admits, "but it was the only practical way to wear my hair when I was fighting."

'When I was fighting…' Suddenly, Nerdanel has to swallow on words asking Elemmírë if she ever saw her two still-living sons (and only one still living now) during the war.

The Vanya seems not to notice Nerdanel's disquiet. "And I found that it was the most practical way when I was sailing to and from home. I think I'll keep it like this until I get home, and see if my parents still recognize me after so long."

Her easy grin reminds Nerdanel all too much of Tyelkormo or the Ambarussa, and it's all Nerdanel can do to remember that Elemmírë is no child, in fact nearly of an age with Nerdanel herself, and not scold her for having been away from her family for so long. She nods stiffly, casting her gaze down to the papers—receipts of past commissions that need reviewing—before meeting Elemmírë's gaze once more. "Will you not stay a while? Telpalma will be back soon, I think."

Nerdanel would be lying if she said she was truly happy with the idea of Elemmírë staying to talk and catch up, and despite the fact that she rarely sets much store by strict adherence to politeness, it is only politeness that makes her extend the offer in the first place. To look at Elemmírë is to be too keenly reminded of the past. She remembers the Vanyarin musician's rare visits to Tirion, how excited her second-born always was to see her. She remembers how, as Makalaurë grew older, he became more attached to outsiders, and cleaved to his family less and less. Elemmírë, the classmate he would eventually marry and her half-Telerin cousins, these were the people he sought out. In retrospect, it seems like he was fleeing the storm that was overtaking his family's home, even then, and Nerdanel wishes she had paid more attention. To Makalaurë, and to so many other things. She's not sure she'll ever stop wishing that.

To her secret relief, Elemmírë shakes her golden head. "Ah, no, my Lady, I can not. There's a wagon train bound for Taniquetil leaving in an hour, and I'm on it." The smile fades from her lips. Elemmírë searches Nerdanel's face almost anxiously as she rummages in her bag. "I just came…" she draws what looks like a loosely-bound book with leather covers from her satchel "…to give you this."

Frowning, Nerdanel reaches out and takes the book from Elemmírë. "And what is this?"

"It was written by your son, Makalaurë. It's due for publication, but I thought that maybe you would like to have a look at it first." A high-pitched, overly animated laugh escapes Elemmírë's lips. "Well, I say it was written by Makalaurë, but this is actually a copy, one of two I've brought back with me. I transcribed what he'd written with the help of his foster-son."

There comes a dull roaring in Nerdanel's ears, and she tells herself that it's not the sound of her heart cracking all over again, and nor is it the sound of screaming trying to break loose. "Foster-son, did you say?"

Elemmírë shifts her weight uncomfortably and nods, seeming like a shadow of the bold, brazen nís Nerdanel has known. "Aye, he had two of them, apparently. Twins by the name of Elrond and Elros, though I only ever met the former. They're very young; Elrond sends you well wishes." Met with silence, Elemmírë dips in a shallow bow (curtseying is impossible in her clothes) and leaves, sweeping out of the front door in what can only be relief.

Nerdanel sits frozen at the kitchen table, staring into nothing, running her hands absently over the leather binding of the book given to her. Foster-sons. So I have other grandchildren yet living in Endóre. And no news of Telperinquar to give to Telpalma. She'd not seen the death of her grandson anywhere in the tapestries in Vairë's Halls, but in all honesty, Nerdanel wasn't looking for him, and he was so young at the time of the Darkening that she isn't sure she'd recognize him now. Grandchildren, left without their father. So alone…

She sighs heavily, knowing too well how it feels to be so alone.

So what is this?

Her second-born has left something behind besides children, it seems. Nerdanel stares down at the book in her lap with trepidation, and sets it on the table over the receipts, opening it to the first page.

Nerdanel is met by a note written in Elemmírë's hand (She's seen enough of her letters to Makalaurë to recognize the Vanya's handwriting). 'Of the more than seventy-five fragments of the Noldolantë…'

Noldolantë.

Fall of the Noldor.

Oh, my son, what is this that you have written? Am I to be left only with the lament you wrote for yourself and your kin? What is this that you have left behind for me?

Nerdanel flips absently through the pages. She sees fragments of poetry and song, copied faithfully, down to the strike marks through the lines, in some cases so heavy that the pieces he wrote are nearly or totally illegible. Nerdanel takes a moment to reflect that it must have taken Elemmírë and Elrond quite a while to transcribe so precisely, before forcing herself to go back to the beginning, and read the note Elemmírë left behind in its entirety.

There are more than seventy-five fragments of song in this thin tome Makalaurë has left behind, and only eleven of them were ever finished. Nerdanel's brow creases and a sharp stab of pain pounds behind her eyes. The Makalaurë she remembers would never leave a song unfinished, even if the finished product was unrecognizable for what it had started out of. But then again, Nerdanel hasn't known Makalaurë for a very long time. She draws a deep breath, and begins to read.

One thing that strikes her immediately: there are three pieces written about Fëanáro. One is unfinished, and two are unfinished. What strikes even deeper is which was completed and which wasn't.

The first appears to have been some attempt at a poem in the epic style about Fëanáro's last stand. There is no hint of emotion in this telling, and eloquent it might be, but it is wooden, so wooden, so proper and correct, and Nerdanel can glean nothing of his thoughts from it.

'…Eyes burning, lit with fire
He approached his foes
Those great in might
Creatures of shadow and flame
They fled before him
Their terror great…'

The second is, as far as Nerdanel can tell, set entirely in Valinor in the days before the Darkening, when Makalaurë was nothing more than a small child. Wistful and raw, she can't help but think it is.

'…Brightly laughing
You wished me well
And joy of it
And said
'Learn all you can,
You were made for great things…'

And the one he finished after all…

'…Where have you gone to? Where will you be now?
Why have you left us? Why have you left me?
We are adrift without you, alone, bereft
We do not know how to live without you…'

Sad and lonely and frightened all at once. So frightened. And so, so angry. Not on first glance, not to someone who does not know him, but Nerdanel can hear the anger in her child's words, just as she always could. You wouldn't even know, just from looking at it, that it was written to Fëanáro. It could be any son addressing his dead father. But it is Makalaurë speaking to Fëanáro. There, you see, Fëanáro? There is your son speaking to you, across time and space and death. Can you hear him as I can? There is your son, and I wish you had remembered, just once, that he and his brothers are far more precious than jewels.

Nerdanel is angry for a moment, before she remembers how tired she is, too tired for anger anymore.

There is some attempt at the chronicling of great deeds; for one of his attempts, Makalaurë appears to have tried to relate Nolofinwë's fateful duel against Moringotto, though that, like so many others, has been left unfinished and disjointed. But for the most part, Makalaurë's Noldolantë is not a chronicle of great deeds. It is so simple. There is sorrow and fear and blood, there is death and despair and guilt, the slow descent towards utter ruin, but he seeks to sing of small things, and sometimes, even of joy as well.

'…I breathe in the new air and think myself free of grief
And in these young lands, I am young too…'

'…And you laugh, rare and sweeter for it
All grief forgotten, for just one day…'

'…I love you more than earth and sky…'

'…And she knows that no grief can last
And that life goes on…'

These songs. Nerdanel can hear her son singing to her, across time and space and the waters of the Belegaer. The words are imbued with his voice, so strong and wondrous fair. She swallows hard against the tears burning at the corners of her tired eyes. My son. My last, lonely son.

One last time, Nerdanel remembers what she saw in the Halls of Vairë. There was a tapestry that caught her eyes after she saw Maitimo's horrific final moments immortalized in thread and weft. She was turning to flee, but it caught her gaze and held it fast, and she drew near to see who was there.

There was Makalaurë. He was alone, completely, utterly alone, sitting on a rock by the edge of the sea. The Sun was setting, or perhaps rising; the sky was set alight, and her son was framed with gold. Foam and seawater lapped at his feet; his hands were clasped in front of him, and his long, loose hair fell all about his face and shoulders. Makalaurë was not staring downwards, as one might expect. Instead, his head was tilted upwards. He stared out at the sky, and the light fell upon his face.

That was his expression then, and here is his music now. Nerdanel can see the same thing in both. There is terrible sadness, and terrible fear, and, most terrible of all, hope.

Fëanáro—Fëanor
Tyelkormo—Celegorm
Carnistir—Caranthir
Atarinkë—Curufin (the way I see it, Nerdanel is probably the only person who calls him that; not even Curufin's maternal grandparents call him 'Atarinkë')
Ambarussa, Umbarto—Amrod and Amras
Maitimo—Maedhros
Makalaurë—Maglor
Telperinquar—Celebrimbor
Nolofinwë—Fingolfin
Moringotto—Morgoth

Nís—woman (plural: nissi)
Endóre—Middle-Earth (Quenya)
Belegaer—The great western sea dividing Middle-Earth and Aman