b2mem | Cradle to the Grave, by Elleth (Reply)

B2MeM Challenge:
N43: Discoveries: Anatomy, Four Words: smith, consonance, cradle, mantle, Horror: Spiders, flies, and maggots, Landscape: Cove, Weather: Sleet, Women of the Silmarillion: Women of Numenor
I22: AU Card: And in that year, the Necromancer, Sauron, revealed himself, and he broke the Council that had come to assail him..., Here We Come A-Caroling: "heedless of the wind and weather", Colours: Lavender, Economy: Climatic Change, Femslash: Valier, Festivals: Funeral/Wake, Food and Drink: Hunting and Gathering, Four Words: order, cascade, small, dogwood, Occupation: apothecary, Relationship: remarriage, Second Age: The Gift of Men, Weather: Hurricane, Write What You Know: A character you dislike--what might you have in common?

Format: Fic
Genre: Double-drabble
Rating: Teens
Warnings: References to death, doom, destruction. Standard Silmarillion fare.
Characters: N/A
Pairings: Vána/Nessa if you squint really, really hard.
Summary: A short history of Númenor.
Note: About the insane number of prompts - I made it a challenge to myself to fit all of my current prompts into the shortest possible space I could. A drabble didn't quite work out (I tried!) but it still was fun.

Consonance surges as the Smith's hammer tears open Arda's mantle. From her cradle, Númenor arises. Waters cascade, and from small beginnings the melody unfolds. Men and women disembark, order prevails for a time. In Nísimaldar, dogwood flowers large and white, and all but the wisest begin to fear their winter. Thence their plight begins: Knowledge of certain death, driving apothecaries and anatomists alike to find eternal life, grants Noirinan no grace, but wakes of dissonant weeping. Estë and Nienna are no longer loved, Vána and Nessa take comfort from one another while human lips curse them as mockeries. Endings abound.

Crops fail, drown, burn, never grow. Hurricanes lash them, sleet stings them, but heedless, cruelty drives people hunting and gathering, to make graceless sacrifices left to flies and maggots: Not fruits, but others' Gifts, substitute returns by force. The old ways shatter; spans shorten, wives and husbands are callously replaced. Discord swells in coves and under skies no longer lavender at dusk. The Necromancer, falsely humbled, assails the council's minds, to war. Manwë grieves the necessary justice to be ordered. Consonance surges as the Smith's hammer tears open Arda's mantle. And Númenor, as all things must, goes to her grave.