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Laughing Water, by Himring
B2MeM Prompt, Card and Number: G48: Agitation- lavender (7. Apothecary Garden), G48: Butter (32. Color Burst 3 - Yellow), G48: Rían of Dor-lómin (133. Mortal Women), N42: I'm writing you a poem. - Dean, Tam Lin (114. Last Lines)
Format: ficlet
Genre: vignette, (emotional) hurt/comfort
Rating: PG (lower Teens)
Warnings: reference to canonical death of a child; grief
Characters: Rían of Dor-lómin
Pairings: n/a
Creator’s Notes (optional): This piece draws on material found in the Unfinished Tales (or in The Children of Hurin), but I think it is possible to follow without having read all the canon. Rian came to Dor-lómin as an exile; she makes up songs.
Summary: A glimpse of Rian after Lalaith, the little daughter of her cousin Morwen, died from a plague sent by the Enemy.
Rian stood on the bridge, gazing down into the water that swiftly ran down from the mountains and away: Nen Lalaith, namesake of her little cousin with the butter-yellow curls that was dead, had died so very quickly, before their own healer’s efforts could take hold or the healer the elves had sent from Barad Eithel could even get here, and was now buried, three days gone. Turin still lay dangerously ill and she had come away after taking her turn sitting with him, had come out of the house to breathe a few deep breaths of fresh air. It felt as if, inside, she had been creeping about murmuring, with bated breath, for days.
Hurin could be hugged and had wept on her shoulder, after he had done shouting and cursing Morgoth for the plague that had swept down on them and taken his daughter. Morwen, predictably, refused any comfort that was offered her as such, so ways had to be found to soothe her more subtly, in as much as it was possible. Not that Morwen was not spotting them anyway, she was too clever for that, even in her grief and fear, but she let the hint of lavender on her shawl pass as Rian being silly. And such things did have an effect, even if it was slight, in the face of another shattering, incomprehensible loss.
Rian leant heavily on the railing, stooped forward, her bones aching with all the weariness and the sadness of the past days. Her eyes followed the fitful light glancing off the surface of the water below, the playful ripples chasing each other downstream. Beneath her, the stream chuckled as before. It went on laughing, even though little Lalaith, who had been named for it, would never laugh or chatter or play again.
Morwen, Rian suspected, would have been offended by that idea, even though she would have fiercely rejected such foolishness and never admitted to it. But to Rian, just then, it seemed a good thing that even though the laughter had gone out of the house it was still out here in the world. It might be flowing out and away, beyond her grasp, but it could still be perceived; she could hear her little cousin’s laughter echoing in the water.
‘I will write you a song, when I can,’ she promised the stream, her lost cousin, the laughter in the water. ‘Not now, not soon, I’m hurting far too much. But when I can.’
Format: ficlet
Genre: vignette, (emotional) hurt/comfort
Rating: PG (lower Teens)
Warnings: reference to canonical death of a child; grief
Characters: Rían of Dor-lómin
Pairings: n/a
Creator’s Notes (optional): This piece draws on material found in the Unfinished Tales (or in The Children of Hurin), but I think it is possible to follow without having read all the canon. Rian came to Dor-lómin as an exile; she makes up songs.
Summary: A glimpse of Rian after Lalaith, the little daughter of her cousin Morwen, died from a plague sent by the Enemy.
Rian stood on the bridge, gazing down into the water that swiftly ran down from the mountains and away: Nen Lalaith, namesake of her little cousin with the butter-yellow curls that was dead, had died so very quickly, before their own healer’s efforts could take hold or the healer the elves had sent from Barad Eithel could even get here, and was now buried, three days gone. Turin still lay dangerously ill and she had come away after taking her turn sitting with him, had come out of the house to breathe a few deep breaths of fresh air. It felt as if, inside, she had been creeping about murmuring, with bated breath, for days.
Hurin could be hugged and had wept on her shoulder, after he had done shouting and cursing Morgoth for the plague that had swept down on them and taken his daughter. Morwen, predictably, refused any comfort that was offered her as such, so ways had to be found to soothe her more subtly, in as much as it was possible. Not that Morwen was not spotting them anyway, she was too clever for that, even in her grief and fear, but she let the hint of lavender on her shawl pass as Rian being silly. And such things did have an effect, even if it was slight, in the face of another shattering, incomprehensible loss.
Rian leant heavily on the railing, stooped forward, her bones aching with all the weariness and the sadness of the past days. Her eyes followed the fitful light glancing off the surface of the water below, the playful ripples chasing each other downstream. Beneath her, the stream chuckled as before. It went on laughing, even though little Lalaith, who had been named for it, would never laugh or chatter or play again.
Morwen, Rian suspected, would have been offended by that idea, even though she would have fiercely rejected such foolishness and never admitted to it. But to Rian, just then, it seemed a good thing that even though the laughter had gone out of the house it was still out here in the world. It might be flowing out and away, beyond her grasp, but it could still be perceived; she could hear her little cousin’s laughter echoing in the water.
‘I will write you a song, when I can,’ she promised the stream, her lost cousin, the laughter in the water. ‘Not now, not soon, I’m hurting far too much. But when I can.’
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Lalaith's death leaves the whole family bereft.
I'm glad you like that image!
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(I have the card "Echoes in the Water". I didn't use any prompt from it, but the idea was there anyway.)
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I feel Rian can be relied on to have written that song, eventually. I'm glad the way I used the quote worked for you.
I wasn't going to include the lavender at first, until the way it could be used by Rian virtually jumped out at me.
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~But to Rian, just then, it seemed a good thing that even though the laughter had gone out of the house it was still out here in the world. It might be flowing out and away, beyond her grasp, but it could still be perceived,~
That's beautiful
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I'm glad you liked that. Rian knows Morwen well, so she already has some idea how to deal with those formidable barriers.
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I'm so glad Rian's able to comfort Morwen too! Poor everyone in this family, really!
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Thank you, Kaylee! I'm glad you liked the idea of the stream.
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- Erulisse (one L)
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I'm glad you liked Rian receiving comfort from the voice of the water! Thank you!
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In a way, the ficlet stands in for the song that Rian promised Lalaith to write...