Chapter Text
My parents were married young, and I came along quite soon after. My father has told me more than once how I was the family olive branch—for though the rift between him and my grandfather was already healed (my grandfather having a generous heart and my father a warm devotion, uncooled by youthful ambition), there is nothing like a cooing babe for general peace.
I am alone in my room, sketching out another tortured attempt at a farewell letter, when Artanis knocks on my door.
“Grandfather is in the parlor,” she sighs, after I bid her enter.
“Why does that vex you?” I ask, hastily closing my journal and locking it. Maedhros gave it to me, this little leather-bound book, with a tiny sealing clasp of my uncle’s make.
I know you love your secrets, he said, smiling a mysterious smile of his own, and I protested, but was grateful nonetheless.
Artanis flings herself in the chair opposite me, in a manner rather unbecoming to one nearing her teens. I only smile; I am not her governess. An older brother is best beloved when he does not chide. “I believe,” she says, “That he has come to make us go on some—some expedition with Uncle Feanor and all his horrid brood.”
Now, I must chide. “Artanis—Galadriel—our cousins are not horrid. They are simply…not like us.”
“They ought to be more like us. We are by far the most civilized and interesting members of our family, excepting Grandfather and Grandmother.”
“I heard you call our brothers boorish blockheads just the other day,” I say, keeping my composure with difficulty. “But what is this expedition you speak of? And were you listening at the parlor door?”
“Of course I was.” Artanis snaps me a glance as if to say, keep up, brother dear. “Though Mama also had me fetch the tea things. She despairs of my carrying, or of my pouring, without being—clumsy.”
“Grace is sometimes learned.” Indeed, even I, who was something of a dandy (and may be still, I fear) have tripped over my own feet in my most beloved pursuits. Only the Feanorians—and at that, only some of them—seem blessed with faerie blood. And well may they be. They are more Irish than any of us.
“Finrod, you must be keen! Did you not hear me? Father is going to agree, and then what shall we do? Be shoved off to Botany Bay with Celegorm?”
Artanis has been reading too much.
“What, exactly, did Grandfather have to say?”
“I did not hear that part. Only something about—Coney Island.”
That clears my mind. Fingon and I were speaking of it recently—how we might coax Maedhros and Maglor to visit us before fall and winter chill set in, and how, by carriage, we might follow the footsteps of fashionable vacationers, and spend a few days frolicking upon the sands. Such pastimes have always held charm for my eldest cousin, but equally does he feel loath to be away from home, in summer.
Or did, I remind myself. His dalliance with Esther Landau has changed him.
(I caught them last month, before his return to Formenos. My cousin’s great height and her petite stature were made immaterial by their ingenious use of our sitting room’s high windowsill. Maedhros, with his hands still in her hair, turned half around to say, Egads, Finrod, I thought you were Fingon—thanks be, for he would be properly scandalized, and I laughed and slipped away.)
(I am delighted, to see my cousin so happy.)
“Coney Island, Father?”
Father has his hands steepled beneath his chin as if praying. He looks almost grave enough to be Uncle Fingolfin, just for a moment, but upon seeing me, his brow clears of its clouds. “Eldest, light of my heart,” he says gaily. “Have you been over-listening?”
“I have my sources,” I answer, with feigned obfuscation. We both know it is only Artanis who presses her ear to keyholes. “Is Grandfather not staying to dinner?”
“No, he is off to visit your uncle,” Father says. He sits down on the sofa and gestures for me to join him. “He has hit upon a plan…for harmony.”
“We shall all holiday together, is that it?”
We exchange a glance: eloquent, longsuffering. Then Father laughs. “We shall share the enjoyments of the seashore, yes.” More solemnly, he adds, “Independence Day is nearly upon us, and you know how much Grandfather cherishes its particular meaning, in his own life and as a boon to our family’s prosperity. But more than that, this is a year of particular joy for him and Grandmother. They have been married for forty years, come August.”
I have not my brother Angrod’s love of dates and numbers, but I do know the date of this anniversary—the tenth of August—because it is always a day of bittersweet celebration. It is one occasion at which we can be certain not to see our Feanorian cousins.
“Do you think Grandfather wishes to…” Force seems too strong a word. “Compel unity in such a way?”
“No, no.” My father rests his elbow on the ridged spine of the sofa, and rests his cheek against his hand, almost like a schoolboy lost in daydreams. He always looks young to me. “I think instead that he wishes to—advance a new tradition, one that includes all of us, and that is bound to our country, our home, as well our relations. So he said to me. You see he was quite—inspired, by this July the Fourth.”
It is like dear Grandfather Finwe, to find deep meaning in a day, or even an hour. It is even more like him to supply a ready story to a legendless epoch. Our next generation is growing up; the letters in my desk confirm it, if only my father knew.
Grandfather Finwe does not know, either, but he has a keen sense for such things.