Disclaimer: The previous disclaimers still stand. This is all Tolkien's, aside from a handful of canon-conscious original characters; I'm just playing with it behind his back and certainly do not intend to make money from it.
I have taken longer than usual with this chapter, but, well, school goes on. The next few will probably run on the same schedule; hopefully there are only a few more.
I will not repeat the full argument between Amandil and Elendil, since it didn't fit the POV. If you want to know, read The Silmarillion.
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7. The Ban
Isildur had intended to let his wife sleep, and answer his family's summons alone; but his attempts to dress silently in their shared room still awakened her. Eventually they ate a hasty breakfast and set out on the path together.
"We are fortunate Elendur tried to stay awake for the New Year," she said. "Otherwise, he'd be awake and wanting to come along too."
"Are the boys all right, alone with your mother?" he asked cautiously. They seldom spoke of the widow's emotional fragility, but much could change in two years' time.
She darted him a defensively sharp glance. "Yes. She is better than when you left us."
"I do not worry overmuch," he qualified apologetically.
She nodded, and changed the subject. "This may be more than a meeting between family," she began tentatively. "Do you know aught of recent events, in the King's service?"
"I know that the captain with whom I sailed home had been summoned in haste," he answered, puzzled. "What has changed?"
"I know not, exactly. That is but the topic of your grandfather's conversation for the past few weeks."
"The palantir…"
"Perhaps our correspondent has returned. I would speak no more of it until we can ask, and be certain."
His parents and grandfather welcomed them warmly, as Isildur had expected to some degree after his absence, but he quickly took in how tired they all looked: defeated, or betrayed by shock. The year before Isildur left, however, Anárion had married and moved into the center of town; talk of politics would wait until he arrived. He fidgeted as he repeated his account of the Havens, and reached the door before Taurnil did.
"Hey!" his brother grinned, and embraced him; the younger man had wished everyone a happy New Year before he realized that anything was wrong.
An awkward moment later, Amandil confirmed that the palantir had again proved useful. "She says that a fleet is to be built in Andúnië, in secret. Ar-Pharazôn wishes to announce it later."
"Andúnië? Why?" Isildur asked blankly. The western haven had no shipyards large enough for a true seagoing vessel. It wasn't practical, when its only patrons were the local boats and the half-forgotten visits from the Elves of Eressëa. The Ban of the Valar prevented the Númenóreans from sailing westward out of sight of land, and had been the only specific command from those Powers for more than three thousand years*.
"She?" Anárion prompted, a second later.
"Our correspondent," Amandil said. "I would rather not let her identity become known. Do not ask me to burden you with the secret. As for Andúnië, Isildurya, you now know as much as I do – enough to hazard a guess."
Much as he hated to admit it, there was only one logical answer. "But they cannot mean to declare war on the West. It's not possible," he protested.
"Ar-Pharazôn the Golden believes anything that pleases him is possible," Elendil said dryly.
"So long as it also pleases Sauron," his wife corrected him, and he nodded bitterly. Isildur knew his father had little capacity for actual cynicism, and this bothered him. Something else was yet wrong.
Looking at Amandil, Eregwen observed, "You intend to act against him, do you not?" Her father's gift came to her only seldom; but when it did, she could tell much that a person had not spoken.
Amandil hesitated and glanced at his son. Clearly they had argued, but Elendil had lost squarely. "I intend to appeal to the Valar, sailing first east – as if for Pelargir – and then turning about. It was done once before."
"Yes, but Eärendil did not ask pardon for a nation of rebels," Elendil muttered, naming the allusion. "Nor was he truly mortal, and thus prohibited from the Deathless Lands."
Grimly, Amandil did not contradict him. "Perhaps it cannot happen so a second time. Yet Númenor will not win this war, and I do not wish our people to fall under Their wrath."
"You would sail to your death," Anárion said softly.
He shrugged. "The King does this because he is old and without hope, and I am no younger than he. I will not speak more of this; only do not hope to find me in Middle-Earth when at last you must sail there. I do not think that what peace the Faithful have will last much longer. You must prepare ships of your own here in Rómenna."
There were murmurs of assent; they had correctly interpreted the last as a command. Eregwen went to him and kissed his forehead solemnly, though the tall man had to stoop to let her do it.
"May the Valar smile on you, Grandfather," she said.
"On all of us."
He departed, with three old friends and a small boat, the same night that she told Isildur she was pregnant.
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*The Númenóreans always had something of an obsession with ocean exploration, but always eastward to Middle-Earth and beyond. The Valar were afraid – and rightfully so – that if they ever saw Eressëa or Aman they would want immortality. This was beyond their power, although the King's Men didn't listen to that point. The Ban of the Valar was therefore cause of much resentment even before the major division in Númenórean opinion. At first, it was actually because they wanted to return the visits of the friendly Elves of Eressëa – even though they later turned Elves away as spies.