Chapter Text
Fëanor would not say he was afraid. Not of the door, not of what may lie behind it. He would not be intimidated by Mandos’s words and he would not be intimitated by a closed door. He raised his hands to push it open, certain that he was prepared. Then he planted his forehead between them, not pushing, before turning away. No, he was not afraid.
There was a tapestry on the wall displaying Alqualondë. Fëanor supposed that it was to make him feel remorse, but he never look at himself or the destruction in the path he had made. Instead he touched each of his sons’ faces in turn. When he had first arrived in the halls he had called them all his enemies. He swore to Mandos that it was necessary, it was completely necessary. But time had worn away his resolve to hate the Teleri and the tapestry did little to hurt or help him. It was simply there, as was he.
The room was quiet for a long time.
Fëanor sat on the floor across the room and watched the tapestry’s stillness. It was strange, but he could hardly stop looking at it. There was something so inherently off about it, but Fëanor could not place it, though he wanted to take it all apart and fix the wrong. He also wanted to shake it. It or himself. Even the air didn’t move in the little square room. Everything was still.
Far too still in fact. Far too still for Fëanor who had rarely stopped moving in life. Far too still for Alqualondë which was all movement and panic and fear. If it had been still, things would not have gone as they had. And at that thought, Fëanor did move, up and across the room, seizing the tapestry and pulling. As it came clattering down on to the floor, the door swung open. Not the one that Fëanor would not say he feared, but the one by which he had entered, and by which the Maiar of Mandos entered. He turned his head slowly to see his new visitor, a defiant smile on his face.
It was not one of the Maiar.
Mandos loomed disapprovingly in the doorway. Fëanor tipped up his chin and met his gaze.
“The tapestry was wrong.”
“Was it now?” Mandos looked at him with a mix of confusion, irritation, and checked amusement. “I was assured that it was accurate.”
“It was too still.”
“Such is the nature of tapestries.”
“It was dark and confused and by no means still. The tapestry is wrong and I will not have it.”
“I will not deny that you were not still, but what of those you cut down? What of your enemies?”
Fëanor turned away at that, staring down at the floor where the tapestry lay crumpled. By this reckoning, the Teleri certainly seemed still and innocent. Memory told otherwise though. At the time, he had not been entirely sure what had made him draw his sword, but he was fairly sure it was as much on them as it was on him.
“They were not still either. Nor where they truly my enemies. I see that much now.”
“That is good.”
“Don’t talk like you know what’s going on in my head. I can assure you that it’s vastly different from what you want or expect,” Fëanor had turned to face Mandos again, speaking quietly, and almost buzzing with suppressed rage. “You want me to confess to a crime? Very well, I confess. I confess to the crime of fear. I confess to anger and confusion and defending myself in the dark. I confess to kinslaying, yes, and I confess to defending my sons.”
Mandos stood silent. Fëanor could not read his expression.
“I will not stand here and act like the only guilty party. None of us knew what we were doing. None of us knew a battle until we were in the middle of one. We were afraid in the dark. We were supposed to be safe here. We were supposed to be safe!”
The silence stretched on for a brief infinity as the weight of his words sunk in. Fëanor stood almost still, watching Mandos watch him. His anger would not leave him. It had seeped into his fëa when that simple truth had burst out. They were supposed to be safe. Wasn’t that why his father had come here?
A sudden desire to see his father again washed over him.
“However potent your words can be, I care far less about them than your actions,” Mandos said in the same calm, even tone. Fëanor had the brief urge to hit him. “You may have noticed that you cannot speak words of such power here.”
Childishly, Fëanor kicked the crumbled tapestry on the floor. Mandos looked at him quizzically.
“I want to see my father.”
“It is not up to me whether you see him or not.”
“How is it not up to you? Isn’t everything in this damn place up to you?”
“I have given you the option to see him. It is not up to me whether you take it or not.”
“What option?”
Mandos inclined his head towards the other door. Fëanor shivered involuntarily, though he would still not admit that he feared it.
“If you fear it —“
“I’m not afraid of a door.”
“If you fear it,” Mandos repeated, “it is because you know what is behind it. You fear a judgement.”
Then he left.
Fëanor watched him disappear from the doorway. He did not move to follow, knowing from experience that he couldn’t move that door. Going back was not an option anymore, but he didn’t know if he wanted to go forwards. Kneeling down, he felt the tapestry between his fingers. Once again, he touched each of his sons’ faces in turn, but then he actually looked at the tapestry. At the dead around them. Those that had died at Alqualondë had been the first dead bodies that many of the survivors had ever seen. Not so for Fëanor. He remembered his father in Formenos.
He rose slowly from the floor. Fear and judgement be damned. He was going to see his father.
* * * * *
The door by which he had entered took an awful lot of effort to get absolutely nowhere. The door by which he was leaving was far easier than that. Fëanor swallowed his worries, pushed hard, and it simply swung open.
There wasn’t a room behind it, only a corridor, at the other end of which was another door, this one propped open invitingly. Fëanor spared one last look at the tapestry on the floor, then let the door shut behind him. Looking back was not going forwards, and go forwards he must. The corridor was warmer and brighter, somehow, than the small square room that he had been inhabiting. There was a different feeling to this whole place. The grey dreariness of the Halls was still there, but it was covered over by the warm familiarity of something that felt rather like home. It reminded him of the forges, or Nerdanel’s workshop, or hearing music drift in an open window on a lazy afternoon.
Fëanor hesitated at the open door. The same tendrils of fear crept up his legs, but he shook them away. He could tell his father was in the room and his fëa was almost calling out to him. It hurt to be without him. Following this desperate desire lead him straight into the room.
Finwë was waiting for him in the centre of the room. His foreign, familiar face shocked the words from Fëanor, who could only stand, shaking, in the doorway.
“Fëanáro,” his father said quietly.
“Atar,” it came out as quiet as a breath.
Finwë moved towards him, slowly and tentatively, reaching his hand out to his son, guiding him into the room.
“Fëanáro. It is alright. I am here. It is alright now.”
Fëanor pressed his face to his father’s shoulder, clinging on to him. Finwë held him close, wanting to never let him go again.
“No it’s not. It can’t be. I’ve done so much. Too much. Atar I was so afraid,” his voice was muffled, but distinct.
Finwë found that there was nothing he could say. He simply stood there, holding his son close to his chest as though he were a child again. He wished it were so. A child’s problems were not this large and crushing.
“And my sons. Oh my sons. Atar, what have I done? I’ve doomed them all, haven’t I?” Fëanor pulled away to look at his father. “And when they come here, what do I do then?”
“You do better. I know that you can. You were trying your best in circumstances that were the furthest from ideal, and I know that you could do better in a better situation. If your sons come here, or if you go out to meet them, do better. Learn from this. Go slower at times. Trust your brothers more.”
“I will try, if I can.”
“All we can do is try, yonya. Try and learn and try again.”