She remembers many things. She remembers holding all seven of her baby brothers. She remembers days spent in her mother's workshop, or her father's forge, watching them work.
She remembers her grandparents and their abounding hugs, for her and her seven brothers. The tentative ones for her father, their son in law. The joyful ones for her mother, their daughter.
She remembers her cousins and the late nights they spent together, both as children and when they were grown. The laughter, the secrets they shared, the friendship, despite the estrangement of their fathers.
She remembers how her father could never quite accept the family of his father's, her grandfather, second wife.
She remembers climbing trees in that grandfather's palace garden and how she and Nelyo had to carry the twins to bed after the feasts.
Arnafinwe Nárefinda Silmíre remembers when her father began his descent to madness. How he spent days in his forge, not letting anyone in, even Atarinkë. Even the twins, who were just barely a hundred, noticed. Her father snapped more, grew more agitated.
He fooled them all though, when he suggested they go to Alqualonde, "As a normal family," he said to their mother. She ironically remarked that the House of Finwe could never be normal.
Silmíre remembers exchanging relieved glances with Maitimo and Macalaurë, because, maybe, just maybe, their father was returning to his old self.
They were wrong though. Silmíre discovered that when she stood on the end of a pier. She discovered that when her brothers shouted her name and she turned to find her father, sword in hand, stalking toward her, the bodies of the dead guards still bleeding behind him.
And oh, his eyes burned. Not with the fire of his soul that was his namesake, but with that, horrible, icy fire. Fire that made you feel burned and cold all at once.
That sword, forged by his own hands, was leveled at her. That sword struck her, and she fell, but instead of the pier, there was the cold water, and the pain. Whether the pain came from her face, where the sword blow had landed, or her leg, where the rope caught it and broke it, Silmíre couldn't tell. She couldn't tell, as she let the darkness take her.
Nelyafinwe Maitimo thought he'd been afraid before. He'd been afraid when Tyelkormo had fallen from a tree and broken his arm. He'd been afraid when their family's house had caught fire and he hadn't been able to find Macalaurë for a second.
But that fear was nothing compared to the fear he felt when he watched his father spill the guts of a guard upon the pier, his eyes filled with icy fire. The fear was much worse when he, along with his brothers, realized what their father's intended target was. When they were shouting her name, but he couldn't. Couldn't shout it, because that fear stole his voice.
It was that fear, that horrible, nauseous fear, that had him running, no, sprinting toward her as she fell, blood on her face, blood on the pier, blood on that sword, blood on his father's hands. The fear got worse, if that was still possible, when her leg caught on that rope and broke.
But he shoved that fear down, down into the depths of his mind. He shoved it down as he kept running. He ran until he reached his father and, Maitimo would never have dreamed of ever standing against his father, tackled him.
That horrid, bloody sword tumbles out of his father's grasp and straight toward the water where Míre fell. No, please not his sister. But Macalaurë's deft, quick fingers have caught the sword hilt and Tyelkormo has dove straight into the water, Maitimo realizes.
His father has stopped struggling against him and his eyes, thank the Valar, are no longer fiery. They're simply empty, blank. Nelyo isn't sure what scares him more, the fire, or the void that is left thereafter.
It takes Tyelkormo far too long to resurface, but when he does, Míre is limp in his arms, eyes closed, blood on her face. The twins are crying.
Maitimo isn't sure how he manages to speak but he does, "Carnistir, fetch a healer to our rooms. Telvo, fetch Amme." Both Moryo and the twins scurry off.
Macalaurë and Curvo are reaching forward to take Míre from Tyelkormo, who is still treading water. Maitimo clenches his fists to stop his hands from shaking.
Nerandel, wife of Fëanáro, believed herself to be quite lucky in having eight children, whatever her father-in-law's court said. She didn't really fully realize this until the day her eldest nearly died.
She had been taking tea with King Olwe and his wife when a guard had entered the room, saying something about her youngest sons. Nerandel, with the grace of a mother accustomed to such interruptions, she thinks, excuses herself and steps into the hall.
Her youngest sons immediately fall upon her, crying (they haven't cried like this since they were children). In between their sobs and their frantic attempts to explain, she can make out only one complete sentence, "Atto killed Míre!"
And oh, she would like to believe this was some game, devised by their older brothers, but the fear in their eyes says otherwise. She grabs them by their hands (still children's hands in her mind) and leads them to the docks, hoping, praying to any Valar who will listen that they are wrong.
Her husband has not been himself of late, and she fears, after that horrid, cursed, fallen Valar came to their door, that he is not himself because that terrible thing has cursed him.
Nerandel throws open the doors and immediately spots the rest of her children. Tyelkormo is dripping wet, and half drags, half leads his father, whose eyes are horribly blank, Macalaurë is crying, Carnistir is letting Atarinkë lean on him, but she does not see this, because her eyes are too busy gazing at her eldest son, who cradles his sister, her only daughter, to his chest, tears on his face.
Numbly, as though her body is acting without her, she moves swiftly down the steps and stops short of Maitimo, who has blood on his hands, blood on his tunic (his sister embroidered that tunic, Nerandel watched her), her daughter's blood. For a moment, she cannot see the rise and fall of her eldest's chest, but Maitimo whispers, his voice hoarse, "She lives."
Finwë, High King of the Noldor, does not like to believe half the things he hears about his eldest son, for he knows them not to be true. When he received a message from King Olwe, saying that Fëanáro had slain three guards and wounded another on the piers of Alqualonde, alongside nearly killing Silmíre, he wouldn't have believed it if his daughter-in-law hadn't enclosed a tearful letter of her own.
The High King left his second eldest, Ñolofinwë, in charge and rode to the port city with all haste, followed swiftly by his youngest, Arafinwë, Earwen, his daughter in law and daughter of Olwe and several guards, though he had no memory of the latter.
Olwe met him at the gates with a group of guards and Finwë could immediately see why. What had to be nearly half the population of the city was filling the streets, shouting things like, "Where is the kinslayer?!" and "Justice! Give us justice!"
There was no doubt of his son's actions now.
Olwe ushered him to the palace immediately, then swiftly through the halls, "You will wish to see your granddaughter, no doubt, but Fëanáro must be dealt with soon."
"I will deal with my son, do not fear." Finwë didn't know how he sounded so calm, when his insides where churning.
Olwe nodded and opened a door for him, closing it behind the high king. It led to a small sitting room, filled with his grandsons.
Tyelkormo and his hound were sprawled upon a window seat. Macalaurë and the twins in various chairs, Carnistir pacing back and forth before the fire. Macalaurë, who had been plucking mournfully at his harp rose and silently showed Finwë to a door on the far side of the room, though he did not open it.
The High King mustered his courage and let himself in. His eldest granddaughter lay still upon the bed, her fiery hair spread upon the pillow, a bandage over her right eye and her right leg propped upon a pillow. Her face was deathly pale.
Maitimo, with his own head of fiery hair, was seated in a chair alongside his sister, clasping her hand. Nerandel (how she looked so calm was beyond him) who was gently stroking her eldest's hair, raised her eyes to meet Finwë's, "She will live, do not fear."
But Finwë does fear, not for his granddaughter's life, but for his son. His bright, brilliant son, who has done something unforgivable, yet, Finwë has already forgiven him.
To Be Continued
