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Eventually, Eonwë was dispatched to return Eldatanno to Tumbafalas, and the rest of the Valar faded back to their usual haunts. The Aratar remained, sensing Manwë’s desire to speak with them.
Ulmo melted from the almost-elven fana he’d taken into a bubbling spring in a crack in the floor of Mahanaxar. Yavana’s roots cracked it further, sliding into the soil as her limbs reached for the sky, fading from her leaf-haired bipedal fana into her favored ash tree. Aulë shrank down into a dwarrow, as he preferred, though Manwë did not know why he’d bothered with the elven fana he’d worn for Eldatanno–the young skinchanger hardly seemed to care what type of fingers were scratching his ears.
Nienna tipped her hood back, showing her face in a way she almost never did outside the Aratar, and perhaps the presence of her brothers alone. “What is it, Lord?” she asked softly, wide eyes wet with her eternal grief for the marred world.
Manwë looked among the others–Varda, starlit as usual at his side; Namo, gravely amused in his own hood; Oromë, antlers twined with flowers from Vana’s fingers. “What happened there?” he asked softly, almost plaintive.
Varda took his hand. “Eldatanno rightly called us to account,” she answered, squeezing his fingers. “More gently and politely than anyone might have expected.”
Aulë huffed a laugh. “Curufinwë Atarinkë once said to me, in Eldatanno’s presence, that he had learned that he did not understand the world on the end of a sword, and that he would not wish that method of learning on anyone. I think Eldatanno has an empathetic and generous heart.”
“More than, perhaps, we deserved,” Varda remarked.
“That’s Eldatanno,” Nienna agreed, smiling sweetly through her tears. “His family is broken, and he wishes to see it fixed.”
Manwë nodded. “And Feanaro’s return will facilitate that repair,” he said slowly, still trying to find the link.
“It was never our right to deny Feanaro’s return,” Oromë rumbled softly. “Delay, condition, but never outright deny.”
Namo dropped his head. “Irmo has said the same,” he admitted.
“He isn’t ready,” Nienna said. “But he could be, but that we denied him.”
Manwë shook his head. “He did great wrong,” he said slowly, trying to follow them.
“Death is not a punishment,” Aulë said. “Or it shouldn’t be.”
This made Namo hiss softly in grief and pain. “A gift,” he said softly. “It was supposed to be.”
You weaponized it, Ulmo gurgled sternly.
“I know,” Namo said. “I erred.” To hear the judge admit this was a shock, but not necessarily a bad one. If Namo could so clearly admit it, then Manwë thought perhaps it would not be so hard for him to find and understand his own failures. Because it was clear, now, that he had made errors, even if he was not yet sure what they might have been. “I should not have named that Doom to them.”
Slain ye may be and slain ye shall be, by weapon and torment and grief, Manwë thought, and knew he wasn’t the only one. It should never have been leveraged against them. But they had done wrong.
“Then how should we have punished him?” Manwë asked, looking among them. “He did wrong.”
“I don’t know that we should have,” Namo said slowly.
Manwë looked at him in surprise.
“I’m going to ask you a question someone else once asked me,” Namo said slowly. “Is justice punitive or rehabilitative?”
Manwë stared at him, aware his mouth was open inelegantly.
“We should have helped him regain himself,” Nienna said quietly, voice cracking on a sob.
Manwë swallowed. “Yes,” he agreed. “Punishment was not just.”
Namo nodded. “For Feanaro, or any who followed him.”
The exile was wrong, Yavanna said, leaves rustling. The land that was theirs should have been no more punishment than death.
Manwë felt his wind in her branches, and reached for the comfort of the touch. “I agree,” he said softly. “But I cannot see how it should have been resolved.”
Varda squeezed his hand again, her eyes shining at him, bright with affection. “We feared,” she said gently. “And in fear, we made wrong choices, just as Feanaro did. And ours were as harmful as his, and far more lasting.”
Manwë regarded her. “Say ye so?” he asked his wife softly. This was a change in her position, one he couldn’t account for.
“Elerondo had hard words for me,” she admitted, smiling ruefully.
“You too?” Oromë asked, chuckling. The tension cracked.
Namo looked around between them. “All of us?” he asked, a hint of amusement wrinkling his eyes.
“Was Eldatanno, for me,” Aulë rumbled.
“Eldaroquen, for Irmo and me,” Nienna added.
Earendil, Ulmo bubbled.
Yavanna rustled, Elerondo was glad to answer my questions too.
“And we are in agreement?” Manwë asked. “That we did wrongly?”
The soft assertions from his council shook him, and he let them see it. “What were we to do?” he asked. “What would have been just?” He had left it to Namo, because he hadn’t known then any more than he knew now.
“Olwë and Ingwë should have had a voice,” Oromë said. “The trail was theirs, more than ours.”
Ingwë had, just once, said he wished he’d been consulted on the matter of the Noldor, if he was truly meant to be High King of All Elves. The Noldor’s greatest wrong had been against the Teleri, not the Valar. Manwë nodded slowly. “Not the Doom,” he said, to be sure. “Once the First Kinslaying had happened, Olwë and Ingwë should have helped us decide the Noldor’s fate.”
“We bear a portion of the guilt for Alqualondë,” Oromë said.
Manwë regarded him. “How so?”
“We should never have forbidden them from returning,” the Hunter said gravely. “And had we not, I think Olwë would have taken Feanaro to Beleriand. He was friends with Finwë too.”
Manwë frowned. “Should we have just let them go into danger?” he asked.
“We should never have brought them from Endorë in the first place,” Aulë said wryly.
Not forever, Yavanna agreed. To visit and learn.
“To teach,” Oromë added. “But not to hide.”
“They should not have needed to hide,” Aulë said. “But that we mishandled Melkor, too.”
Manwë looked away. He had long known he had misjudged his brother. “His repentance was not true,” he said quietly. “I was wrong to trust him.”
I don’t think so, Ulmo burbled gently.
To trust blindly, Yavanna hissed in a rustle of leaves. But not wrong to trust.
Oromë said, “When Maicitilo Lomion was released, the Hunt welcomed him, so that he could be monitored closely to make sure he did not revert to evil choices.” He huffed softly.
“They chose to be better,” Manwë murmured, repeating after Eonwë, repeating after Eldaroquen, “They didn’t choose to be idiots.” He shook his head ruefully. “I chose to be an idiot.”
“You hoped he would be better than he was,” Varda told him gently. “And you were wrong, yes, but it was understandable.”
Tyelperinquar did the same, Ulmo gurgled.
“And suffered terribly before death for it,” Manwë said.
“Because Arda is Marred,” Varda said.
“Because of our brother,” Manwë insisted. “I made a mistake, and everyone suffered for it. And I have not faced that till now.” He sighed softly. “One of many, I begin to see.”
Aulë said gently, “We all failed our due diligence in our leadership of Arda as far as Melkor was concerned. If nothing else, we should have gone with them when they wanted vengeance, and stopped our brother then.”
“Our father’s land was their birthright,” Namo agreed softly. “They should have been allowed to return, and not simply to seek justice for the murder of their king, which happened on our watch.”
Varda nodded. “They should have been allowed to be in Endorë, and we should have been there with them.”
Namo hummed. “We did not just take it from them; we also forsook those who refused to let us do so.”
“We did twice-wrongly by the Avari,” Varda agreed. “I have spent much time with them of late.”
They love the stars, Yavanna whistled, warmth in her tone.
Varda smiled at her. “And they long ago forgave our trespass,” she agreed. “And yet that trespass remains.”
Manwë thought he was beginning to see. “The Noldor repented and were forgiven,” he said.
“They shouldn’t’ve had to,” Oromë muttered.
“No,” Manwë said. “I mean,” he hummed. “They repented. Formally and openly. We have done no such thing.”
Oromë looked at him in surprise.
Manwë smiled at his Hunter. “You thought you’d have to work harder to get me there?” he said wryly.
Oromë’s rueful grin was answer enough.
“I know Justice,” Manwë reminded them. “And though I struggled long with the Darkening, once my nose has been rubbed in it, I can see what is before me. I can see that we owe them, even if I cannot see what.”
“We ask them,” Nienna said softly.
Manwë nodded. “We ask them how we might make amends.”
“And we ask them to tell us when we misstep again,” Namo added gravely. “For I think it likely that we have made many more mistakes than we are aware of, even now.”
“Elerondo will,” Varda said, fond wryness glittering like gemstones in her eyes. “And his sons.”
Oromë hummed. “Findarato Ingoldo has never hesitated to call power to account,” he offered. “Nor Turkafinwë Tyelkormo.”
Yavanna’s leaves rippled in laughter. Truth, she creaked, Though their mothers have better sense and a wider view, both.
What if we formed a council? Ulmo burbled thoughtfully.
“Oh,” Nienna whispered.
Varda nodded. “With representatives from many groups, to advise us and counsel us.”
“It was always intended to be a mutual relationship,” Oromë rumbled. “Teaching and learning.”
Manwë nodded slowly. “I like this idea,” he murmured.
“Mahtan,” Aulë said.
“The Avari, too, have many who would teach us well–and I think the Amanyar would benefit from their wisdom as well. I can think of several who would suit the role,” Varda added.
Manwë could not think of many elves who would suit, and he knew it was his own shortcoming, in not knowing enough elves. He knew Eonwë had been making an effort to meet more elves, but he had not yet made the effort to follow his Herald where he knew he needed to go. But he knew the answer to this: “I think we should ask them,” Manwë said blandly, “Who they think would best represent them to us.”
Namo grinned. “You catch on quick,” he drawled softly.
Manwë smiled back at him. “I try,” he demurred, aware of his own shortcomings in a way he only rarely was.
Varda bumped their shoulders together, glittering with affection. Ulmo splashed gentle approval, and Oromë grinned. Manwë let the edge of his mouth turn up, just slightly, knowing he was safe with his wife and siblings.
Elerondo had not just given them a better understanding of their wrongs, he thought, but also a better understanding of what it meant to be a family.