Fëanaro goes back to school with a sullen mood; once there things grow far, far worse.

In Tirion, most children are tutored privately or by their own parents, alone or most likely in small groups, no more than five children at a time. Fëanaro tutored all of his children himself, but for the twins who learnt they letters with Nelyafinwë. In retrospect he admits he wasn't that good of a teacher. With the exception of his son Curufinwë, whose mind works much like his one, he was always too quick for his children, somewhat unable to adapt his vast knowledge to their simpler needs. Only Curufinwë has his insatiable thirst, uncanny comprehension of things. His brothers owe most of their talents to their mother's more comprehensive tutoring.

Now, Fëanaro finds himself in a room with fifty children, sitting cross legged on the ground with a small pile of slates, and thinks he never, ever looked stupider in his whole life. He is twice as big as any of them. He is probably older than all of them put together, and he would still need to multiply this number to get it right.

The worst thing is probably that the children share his mind. His presence raises whispers and chuckles. He doesn't deign to react to them, but his pride is still chaffing.

There is a single teacher with four assistants. The master stands on a stone platform in front of a wall entirely made of slate; quite clever, considering that teachers in Tirion have to work solely with paper and wax tablets. There is no direct interaction between him and the children: he directs the class, sketching strings of symbols to be recopied over and over until the letters are drawn right, while the assistants check them and correct the mistakes. The class as a whole looks like a well-oiled machinery, full of disciplined little things, and it's amazing that so many of them can learn with half the number of adults required in Tirion, though Fëanaro cannot guess how they adapt to the uniqueness of each student.

He has been left to himself for an hour, trying to keep up with what is in front of him, but he is barely able to. He doesn't understand the logic behind the symbols, their construction and whatever, he just ends up copying what he sees like a dumb beast. He has never been able to work on anything he cannot understand, and it is plaguing him again: he wants to know how the symbols works, why they are that way, how they fit with each other, who made them and when. He doesn't even know half the words he is supposed to copy.

He is not used to not knowing anymore.

When an assistant finally shows up, Fëanaro is growing more and more frustrated. His mind, which has left him alone for most of his stay in Angamando, is finally starting to plague him again with endless interrogations.

"Those letters are sloppy. Erase them and show me how you make them."

Fuming, Fëanaro does so, satisfied, at least, that the slate allows him not to waste anything.

"Stop. Show me how you use your piece of chalk – no, that's not it. That's how you hold it," he takes the stone from his hand and pinch it between his fingers. "Try now. Always start forming the letters from top-left toward the bottom, then the right. Relax your hand at the end of each stroke. Have you ever written on clay?"

"No. We use paper."

"What kind of medium do you usually write with?"

"Mostly feathers. We also use stylus on wax instead of slates and chalk."

"I've never used wax, but I think it's somewhat comparable to clay. When you write on clay, the pressure of the hand is important lest you end up with uneven lines and very disgraceful finishes for the lines. We also use brushes on paper for long and complicated documents..."

"... and the movement of the hand shows dramatically when using brushes."

"Exactly. Movement from top-left to bottom-right is considered graceful and harmonious. So are straight lines, but you have a firm hand and that shouldn't be a problem. Keep practicing them. I'll come back to you."

He waits another hour or so until the assistant comes back with a whole alphabet written on clay. It takes him yet another hour to wrestle a compliment from the assistant. When the class ends at midday, Fëanaro is almost disappointed that it is not going on for the afternoon, now that he is getting truly started.

Mirfin arranged for him to work at the nursery. The choice left Fëanaro puzzled: he was expecting to be coerced into crafting weapons or tools, not to feed and clean wailing babies.

"You insisted that you have seven children and raised them yourself, did you not?" the Mulak pronounces rhetorically. "That would make you more than qualified, and I'm more inclined to trust you with children than with molten metal."

He is even more puzzled when his brother is proven right.

He is working under a nasty, severe lady with a bland face and a heavily scarified face. She is always hovering behind his back; when she is not, she sends someone else to do so. Fëanaro is annoyed to be mistrusted so: he would never harm an innocent child and yes, he knows how to hold a baby, thank you, even if he is not used to take care of fifty babies and certainly not of having ten of them per room. He is starting to think that everything in this place is made for groups: children are born in groups, nursed together, taught together, and adults don't seem very individualistic either. He asks where the babies' parents are and is answered with astonished faces: apparently, parents aren't involved at all past the birth.

The noldo doesn't understand how it can be so. He felt very strongly the death of his mother. Every absence of his father was painful when he was little. He was loathe to let his own sons out of his sight for too long, always feeling like he was abandoning them... and now, Fëanaro is in charge of ten parentless children, a sight he cannot bear without grief. It is not boredom or obedience that spur him to the side of each and every one of them as soon as they begin to cry.

He misses his own children.

He realizes he hasn't been thinking much about them lately. His trials have made him very self-centered, more than Fëanaro ever was, as if the world has shrank to the limits of his own skin, or to the walls of his chamber in Mirfin's mansion. He doesn't know if he wants to allow the babes to get to him. It feels like a crack in the meager walls he still has to protect himself.

He dines with Mirfin again. His mind is full of letters (Why? How?) during the blessing. He is so engrossed in them (Why are sentences organized that way? How are you supposed to translate this peculiar quenya construction?) that Mirfin has to shake him a bit to remind him to eat. The gesture sends a surge of pain through his back.

"Did I hurt you?" the Mulak asks. He doesn't sound sorry, but then, Fëanaro has never heard him apologizing for anything. Perhaps it's a concept that doesn't exist in Angamando.

"You surprised me." He's not going to complain since Mirfin is only going to be annoyed by his weakness. "Does your back hurt?"

He is startled to think that he forgot completely about Mirfin's wounds. Somehow, the information didn't quite process, perhaps because the white-haired elf never looks like he is suffering. Still, Fëanaro feels shocked at this misstep. When did he loose his capacity to care and empathize? When did his world reduce itself to himself? Was it before or after his capture?

No, he thinks, he used to think of others than himself, but he had few spare thoughts for his children. Before Angamando, his thought were constantly for Finwë, his smile, his ravaged face, his failings, his lullabies, his love, his absences... Fëanaro had always feared the day when his father would finally grow tired of him and abandon him altogether. He hadn't been prepared for his father to be wrenched from him, not of his own volition but by death.

Death brought by him. Whatever Mirfin said, Fëanaro had killed both his parents, and now his children would die because of him.

"I can bear it," Mirfin answers. They are talking in quenya this evening. His voice sounds weirdly like Macalaurë's despite his heavy accent. "It's healing nicely. Thank you for asking."

"I should have asked sooner. It was insensitive of me. I'm sorry."

"Do not be sorry. If you wronged someone, act to make things right. Feeling sorry is not going to change anything. Saying you are sorry is more than thinking, but it's still too easy. Actions are always more worthy of attention."

"Can I help you with your back this evening?"

"I would like that."

During the treatment, Mirfin asks him about his day. For once they share something of the present time instead of century-years-old stories. They speak mostly of the letters. Mirfin is something of a recognized linguistic genius, though he doesn't have much time to indulge to this hobby, and he answers with passion to his brother's prodding enquiries. Fëanaro doesn't give voice to his discomfort with the children, especially since Mirfin is quite vocal about how he is pleasantly surprised by his behavior.

"I have been told that you have a very sensitive touch with the small ones. It is true you are soft by our standards, and that softness is often considered weakness among my people, but it is not always so. It is a gift for the followers of Fluithin, and a rare one here. I am proud of you."

Fëanaro refrains from arguing that he is neither soft nor sensitive, but Mirfin probably doesn't want to hear that his own people are heartless brutes. Perhaps the nursery is notsuch a bad choice after all, if it is the only place where he can behave as his civilized self.

He slowly finds his place in the following days. The teacher's assistant grows fond of him and he is quickly drowning in work, in his own corner of the room, eating documents and exercises at an astonishing speed. In less than a month he is fluent both in speaking and writing and moves toward advanced, poetic and specialized literature. By the second month the assistant introduces him to the Cirth, the alphabet invented but not used by the Sindar, to allow him to use the comparative texts written in both Sindarin and the Holy Tongue (these texts are meant to teach Sindarin, but with him it works the other way around). By the third he moves to math and loves how it is considered a part of linguistic rather than a separate science.

Fëanaro knows he is burying himself in intellectual pursuits, as he always does when he doesn't want to face grief. He behaved thus when Miriel died, when Tirion grew tense and his people all but rejected him, or when his marriage crumbled. He fills his head with questions and new information and discoveries and formulas, and he comes back to the surface only to bring Mirfin back down with him, who is old enough to have known the first time of the Holy Tongue and speaks the best Valarin Fëanaro ever heard in the mouth of an elf.

The only thing anchoring him to reality are the children. Here, too, he wins grudging respect. He is tireless, utterly devoted, beloved by the little creatures. The nursery is his haven of innocence in the most terrible place in Arda. He knows he is trying hard to be oblivious to everything else: to the fact he's raising soldiers who will try to kill his sons, to the fact that prisoners are being tortured when he's hugging the delicate bodies.

Every time he thinks of them, of his people and how they suffer, his mind starts to fill with formulas. The letters buzz until they obliterate all thoughts.

He is a coward. He doesn't care.

It feels good.

Fëanaro notes how Mirfin goes out of his ways to accommodate him.

The Mulak starts to wash the cosmetics off his face before they dine instead of later. He looks surprisingly normal without the blackened lips, kohl and whitened skin. Fëanaro spots dark roots in his hair once. Mirfin admits he bleaches them white. His mind learns to ignore the scarification.

He begins to see likeness between Mirfin and Nolofinwë in the structure of the face. His voice sounds like Macalaurë's, his eyes (if he imagines them alight) look like Tyelkormo's. He learns he speaks to animal too, a talent he inherited from Miriel. Little by little, Fëanaro manages to make him fit in the puzzle of the house of Finwë.

They almost always eat together, despite Mirfin's claim that he usually dines in public. The food changes gradually to conform to the noldo's tastes. Fëanaro replaces the beta who nursed the Mulak's wounds, and when they require healing no more, Mirfin still visits for long hours. He starts to sleep in Fëanaro's room despite the small bedding. Fëanaro doesn't protest. He never enjoyed sleeping alone and likes to find him there, snoring softly, every time he wakes from a nightmare.

By the fourth month, Mirfin takes him to the Temple of the Mother. Fëanaro still feels uncomfortable around Fluithin, but she doesn't look like Miriel this time and it helps tremendously. She is hazel haired with doe eyes, freckles and an ample bosom.

"My baby boy!" she shouts with delight. Despite her elf-looking body, she glides more than she walks. She is also two heads taller than Fëanaro, making him effectively child-sized compared to her; his face ends up between her breasts when she hugs him. "How are you? Are you eating well?"

"I am. Thank you."

He is supposed to call her "mother", but the word stay stuck in his throat. Fëanaro only has one mother and she is dead. He endures, embarrassed, as she pets his cheeks and arms to check if he has gained weight.

"Is Mirfin taking good care of you?"

"Of course I am," the Mulak retorts, but Fluithin tu-tus him with a frown.

"I'm asking him, son."

"He is."

"Good. I always thought Mirfin would make a wonderful big brother. Do you need anything?"

"No, thank you."

I need to escape, he thinks, but oddly the thought doesn't come naturally. It's like he has to consciously consider escaping, instead of being obsessed by the idea.

She kisses Mirfin on the brow and gives him a short hug before she sends him away. Fëanaro shots him a mocking smirk, amused at the sight of the dignified Mulak cuddling like a ten years-old. Mirfin frowns and leaves with a studied dignity.

Fëanaro notices her hair are turning silver at the tip.

"Do you mind? It comes naturally for me, but I can restrain myself if it makes you uncomfortable."

"I don't want to be rude."

"Rude? It's not being rude if you ask nicely."

"I... I'd rather you keep your current appearance, if you don't mind."

"Not at all. I am a very forgetful person, you may have to remind me to stick to it from time to time, alright?"

"Thank you. Must I call you mother or can I…?"

"You can call me Fluithin if it pleases you."

She smiles sweetly and caresses his cheek with fresh fingers. She never feels quite solid, not like the usual maiar from Valinor. Fëanaro can't help but think that something must be wrong with her. How can a being so nice live in Angamando? He thinks of Mairon's fair appearance and pretenses and feels like throwing up.

He follows her deep into the temple. Her house serves as a healing facility. Mirfin insists that he should have his medical skills evaluated by the Lady herself. The prospect troubles him. Will he be required to aid soldiers, enemies of his people? If she allows him to refuse such a task, would the refusal weight heavier on his conscience than acceptance?

He is faced with his first patient, a slave with a severe burn on his arm. At least the noldo doesn't have to make a choice… should he feel guilty that he's relieved? He is, in any case, confident that he knows how to treat this kind of wounds. Being a smith exposed him to plenty of those in his career. Fluithin nods approvingly to his suggestions; strengthened by his first success, Fëanaro, while unable to provide answer to every enquiry, feels that he manages well.

At the end of the day, he follows Fluithin to her studies. She offers little cakes and mushroom-tea in a way very reminiscent of Indis, only Fëanaro somehow feels like she is genuine. He is more and more puzzled by her everlasting gentle behavior, her body full of curves, yet so light she could be blown away by the lightest wind.

Her room is the fluffiest place he has ever been in. He has to tip-toe between pillows of all colors, some so worn out they are almost falling apart, and can't even see the walls, drowned as they are under sever layers of tapestries. She lights several small colored paper-lanterns. She pulls out a whole set of plates, all broken and repaired with molten gold.

Mairon was right, she does break everything.

"I am very happy to see you healing, my love. Seeing you suffer… I could not bear it." She hands him a dish filled with so much cakes he could feed half a family with them. "Do you need anything?"

I need to go home.

"I have nightmares," he admits reluctantly, yet the words flow freely from his mouth; something is at play here, something that lay down his defenses. "And I would rather be with my own family, actually."

"I know. Being separated from the one you love is terrible. But you have your elder brother to look after you, do you not? I know he loves you. Did you tell him about the nightmares?"

"Ah, hem, no. I don't think he would understand. He trusts Mairon blindly and cannot…"

Fëanaro catches himself before he says anything damning. He doesn't know how Sauron will react and doesn't care to find out.

"I know he hurt you. It won't happen again. I was very clear. Mairon is not allowed to hurt my babies."

"With due respect, my Lady, he's… not exactly…" Why does he trust her? Why does he want to betray himself, and tell her everything he feels about her ally's cruelty? "It's happening all the time. People are tortured, punished horribly for meager affronts! No one even knows how to behave with at least a modicum of morality! Even if Mairon was the fair leader he claims he is, he admitted himself that he's not in control of himself. He told me himself that no one, no one is safe from him!"

"You are safe."

"My Lady…"

She's over him in a split second, her white arms around his shoulders, hair turned silver and a frightful light on her face. She does look like Miriel now; only her eyes are duller, the light of the Trees absent. Her hair float around her as in water. Slowly, the Light creeps into her iris.

Her height gives the illusion that he is a child again, so very small against her strong, overpowering adult body.

"You are my baby. I made myself clear. I do not care if he is Mairon or Sauron or whatever he wants to be called, if he dares to hurt my baby son, I will make him pay. Melkor may need him, but he loves me."

She shakes her head. She seems to remember her promise now: color bleeds back into the floating strands.

"Love is a very powerful thing, Fëanaro. Once, a long time ago, I was loved by the most beautiful and terrible of us all. Sometimes Melkor remembers. He likes to indulge me, and my whims are few and easily satisfied. He allows me to cherish and protect my children."

He wishes he could snake away from her arm. Her sadness tingles against his skin, meddled with an animal possessiveness. The father in Fëanaro recognizes it too well. He feels the same toward his sons. He dreamt his father felt it too, toward him. The faint hope that she may, perhaps, be something else, something beautiful lost in Angamando flickers and dies under the crushing power of her maternal cravings.

He knows he will never escape. Even without the curse of Fairëliantë, even if Sauron and Moringotto himself allowed him to get away.

She will never, never let him go.