A Spitting Image

[heartofoshun.livejournal.com]

B2MeM Prompt: Blue Path, Artwork, Realistic
Format: Artwork with short, short story
Genre: Family
Rating: Gen
Warnings: none
Characters: Nerdanel, Fëanor
Pairings: Fëanor and Nerdanel
Creator’s Notes (optional): Photo is my own.
Summary: Fëanor feels sorry for himself.

“She made images, some of the Valar in their forms visible, and many others of men and women of the Eldar, and these were so like that their friends, if they knew not her art, would speak to them; but many things she wrought also of her own thought in shapes strong and strange but beautiful.” --Morgoth's Ring, "The Later Quenta Silmarillion: Of Fëanor and the Unchaining of Melkor."

Nerdanel had worked hard while she was carrying their children--too hard he often thought. He sometimes discovered her pushing and pulling large blocks of stone or wood around. But after she had given birth and throughout the period of lactation, which had seemed never ending, with Carnistir in particular, she barely worked at all.

Their fourth son had been a difficult baby. She had taken to putting him to her breast as method of quieting him. He and Nelyo had also fallen into the habit of seeking her out while they were watching him and he began to whine or fuss and all but beg her to nurse him.

She fell asleep too early at night and there were times when Fëanáro actually felt as lonely and bereft as if she had truly left him. He longed for that carefree maid who had always been ready for an adventure, with her sharp, fierce intellect, and her joyful and hearty appetite for love-making. In those halcyon days, she could ride as hard and walk as long and far as he could.

But most of all he missed watching her work. She seemed to pour two years or more of her creative power into nurturing each of their sons to the exclusion of anything else. The only other things she seemed to enjoy crafting during those periods of their infancies and early childhoods were a series of endless, fiddling sketches and small paintings of their faces, and of their tiny hands and feet and their pearly perfect milk teeth. Eerily minute in detail, they manifested a hyperrealism that could be fascinating or repellant depending upon the beholder. ‘What kind of witchy magic is this?” a farmer in Formenos had asked when he saw one of them once. Fëanáro rather admired them in the beginning. And why would he not? They did, of course, reflect in exact miniature his own most beloved creations to that point.

There were hundreds of those pictures scattered around her work room, stuffed into cupboards, sideboards, and closets all around the house. He had found them with lists of supplies scrawled on their backs or perhaps someone’s first attempt at Tengwar in a childish hand.

He had framed many of the earliest ones she had made of Nelyo and Kanafinwë. He only kept one or two of his favorites of each of the younger boys. In later years, he had come to view them as an annoying distraction from her true work. She had clearly mastered the form to perfection, what more did she have to explore?

The night she refused to accompany them into exile in Formenos, as he had prepared to storm out of the house without her, chest aching with sorrow and rage and unshed tears burning his eyes, he yanked a worn bag out of a wardrobe in their bedroom and a small sketch of Carnistir as a toddler fluttered to the floor. It had seen better days. Its corners were dog-eared. It had a red wine stain ring on its back. There in glorious detail was the handsome face of little Carnistir, every eyelash perfect, the near invisible scar on his upper lip barely discernible. The pain was almost more than he could sustain. He stuffed it into his bag along with several pairs of socks and handful of smallclothes. How dare she do this to him--the mother of his children, his one and only love. He could only hope she would regret it and reconsider.

Comments

[lindahoyland.livejournal.com]

I like to think of Nerdanel sketching her children.

[heartofoshun.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much for reading, Linda!

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I can just imagine the way he had many of her pictures of the first two, but fewer of the younger ones! And how he could come to resent her time spent in this way; he seemed to think arts were only there to be perfected, not followed for their own pleasure.

But you now what I like best? That image of him stuffing things into a bag to take into exile - it is very male to only take a couple of pairs of socks and some clean underpants, somehow :)

[heartofoshun.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I speak from observation about people with big families and the wanning interest in documenting every move!

That image of him stuffing things into a bag to take into exile - it is very male to only take a couple of pairs of socks and some clean underpants, somehow :)

You made me laugh! It's true and canon that he brought horses and weapons. Whereas, it's also canon that Finrod and his family brought tons of junk with them. In my character bio of Finrod, I cited The Shibboleth of Feanor and The Silmarillion, '“Finrod had brought more treasure out of Tuna than any of the other princes.” This Noldorin propensity for cherishing their possessions is also reflected in the above reference to the things that provided them “solace and a burden on the road.”' They traveled heavy and Feanor, et al., traveled light--maybe that might why he left them and went on without them? (Just kidding! But have you ever traveled with people who vastly over pack!)

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

But have you ever traveled with people who vastly over pack!

My husband would tell you that he does... but, honestly, I am so uncoordinated that I really do need a clean top for every day and at least one spare per 3 days as a minimum!

[lynndyre.livejournal.com]

This seems very Feanor! Very intense and very not getting the other person's pov. Poor Nerdanel!

[heartofoshun.livejournal.com]

Thanks!