#tuilindien

[elesianne]

A Silmarillion fanfic for @finweanladiesweek​ day 6 – original characters

Summary: Moriel, daughter of Caranthir, practises archery, gets advice from her father and receives a new name from her mother.

Wordcount: ~3,700 words; Rating: General audiences

Some keywords: family, father-daughter relationship, insecurity, names, Years of the Trees

A/N: This is a sequel to several fics in my Fëanorian marriages series but I don't think you don't need to have read them to read this.

This fic is dedicated to @alkarinqque​, as I promised many months ago, because you have inspired me with yourenthusiasm and support to write more about Moriel. I hope that you like this.

Warning: There is discussion about looks, a sense of belonging, and beauty standards in the first chapter. There is no heavy angst or dysmorphia but I thought I'd warn anyway.

Moriel is the elven equivalent of about nine or ten years here.

*

Daughter of arrows and stars

On most days Carnistir enjoys teaching his older daughter mathematics and the other subjects that he is more equipped to handle than Tuilindien. On days like this, though, when Moriel cannot keep still for five seconds at a time, he has to breathe deep to keep his fragile patience from fraying too far.

'Do you have ants in your socks and sleeves?' he snaps when her slate falls to the floor from her tapping her chalk on it too forcefully. 'As it seems you cannot keep your hands or feet still at all.'

For a reply, his daughter scowls. She is good at it, with her expressive black brows and her hair falling to her face as a curly dark curtain.

Carnistir stands up. 'Let's go outside.' Something physical to do will be easier for them both.

Moriel looks confused. 'We always do mathematics in the morning and outdoor and workshop lessons in the afternoons.'

'Today we're going to have archery practice in the morning and return to tackling arithmetic after lunch.'

He is not going to interrogate Moriel about why she is so restless. She will tell him when he is ready, he knows. He was the same as a child.

He picks up Vaniel from the sturdy wicker basket where she has been babbling quietly to herself. Her chubby cheeks spread to a wide answering smile when he smiles down at her. She is such a happy baby, content to wait in her basket during Moriel's morning lessons, easily soothed by warm thoughts from Carnistir if she becomes bored or disgruntled.

'Let us go see if your mother can look after you, sweetheart', Carnistir says to Vaniel, smoothing down her wrinkled tunic. She says something in reply but for now, her words are all her own, incomprehensible to others. She will speak soon, though, Tuilindien says, and her intuitions about their children tend to be right.

Moriel grabs the empty basket and the three of them make their way to Tuilindien's study a few doors down.

Moriel throws open the door and declares loudly to her mother, swinging the basket in her hands, 'I cannot keep still and arithmetic is boring today so papa and I are going to shoot some arrows.'

Carnistir wonders how his child inherited Makalaurë and Curufinwë's flair for drama. Well, it is Fëanáro's flair for drama, originally, so his father is to blame for this too.

Tuilindien puts down her quill. Carnistir is sorry to have interrupted her writing.

'Is that so?' she asks and comes to them, wide yellow skirt swishing quietly. 'Vaniel will be staying with me, then.' She takes the baby from Carnistir and kisses her cheek. 'Yes, my little darling, you are far too young for archery.'

'I am sorry for the intrusion on your work', Carnistir says while Moriel puts down the basket on Tuilindien's long desk and then sets to making faces for Vaniel to laugh at.

'It is all right. I would probably have had to come to feed her soon anyway. Well, Moriel dear, I wish you the best of luck. Any day now you'll outshoot your father.'

Moriel preens. 'He's not very good.'

Carnistir gives in to the childish temptation to roll his eyes while Tuilindien tries to hide her grin. 'I'm better with a hunting spear', he says.

'You should teach me to use it, then', says Moriel, snake-quick to take the opportunity.

'I'm not giving you a spear yet.'

'You could', Moriel argues, and they argue about it all the while they go change for archery and gather the things they need and make their way to the little practice area that is partially in the garden and partially in the orchard behind it.

It is a years-long argument already. Carnistir knows he will give in soon.

They practise for a while, starting by stretching and then Moriel shoots at the different targets while Carnistir corrects her stance and grip and other small things that he still knows a little better than she does. If Moriel's interest and improvement in archery endures, Carnistir will soon have to ask Tyelkormo to take over teaching her.

Suddenly, in the middle of attempting to hit the farthest target, Moriel lowers her bow and says, 'I don't like the way I look. I don't look like anyone.'

Carnistir's confusion must show because Moriel clarifies, 'Not like anyone in the family.'

Carnistir takes her bow and his and puts them down on the bench, sitting down next to them and drawing Moriel with him to sit beside him.

'I could list all your body parts and who they look like', he offers lamely. Her mother's skin tone, his freckles and eyes, the same texture as hair as Tuilindien has but the colour from him…

'No.' Moriel scoffs. 'As a whole I don't look like anyone in the family and I don't like it.'

Carnistir's first instinct is to protest, to deny that it matters at all who or what she looks like. But he knows from painful personal experience that it does – it took him until the moment of Moriel's birth to make his peace with his own looks – and he knows that Moriel often finds more value in logic and method than simple declarations of what is important in the speaker's opinion.

He begins at her very expanded family. 'I think that when you have more cousins – more great-grandchildren of grandfather Finwë, I mean – there will be more people in the family who look like you. Itarillë does, though she is still small.'

'Very small.' Moriel scrunches up her nose. 'She is never going to be tall, even when she grows up.'

'Well, her Vanya mother is short unlike yours. Let's see.' He leans against the back of the bench, warm in the light, Moriel a light, warm weight against his side. 'Cousin Findekáno –'

'Half-cousin', Moriel corrects, parroting her grandfather. This once Carnistir wishes she didn't. It is not conducive to what he is trying to say.

'Findekáno looks a lot like you', Carnistir plods on. 'With curly black hair and grey eyes and brown skin –'

'Darker than mine', Moriel interrupts again.

Carnistir ruffles her hair. 'Let me make my point, pipsqueak. He looks a lot like you. Perhaps, if you want to give your grandfather conniptions, you should wear your hair braided with gold one day.'

Moriel snorts. 'Only if I'm very angry with him some day.'

'There's a plan. To my next point: yes, you don't look very much like any of your cousins or aunts or uncles. Well, no one looks like Tyelkormo either, do they? Or me. My face is so different from Curvo and Cáno's.'

Moriel nods, grudgingly admitting the point.

'I still wish', she says. 'All of my Vanyarin cousins look so different from me, too.'

'They do', Carnistir admits. 'Because unfortunately none of your aunts had the good sense to marry a Noldo.'

That doesn't inspire laughter. Carnistir thought it rather funny.

Detaching Moriel from his side and turning to face her, he says, drawing gentleness from within himself and resorting to the approach he originally abandoned, 'It does not matter if you don't look much like anyone in the family. In our closest little family – you, me, your mama and Vaniel – no one looks much like anyone else but we belong together anyway.'

'We do.' Moriel sighs, and Carnistir can practically see her shoulders lose some of their tension.

He draws her in for a long hug, and she comes willingly now. Blowing frizzy curls out of his mouth and carding his fingers through them, Carnistir says, 'You will likely have more little sisters or brothers someday and they may well look like you.'

Without lifting her head, Moriel mumbles, 'It is not just that I don't look much like anyone I'm related to but also that… sometimes I feel that I am too tall and too strong. I have big hands and I'm as broad and tall as Tyelpë. It isn't… no maiden of song ever looks like that. I don't think I'm very pretty.'

What rot, Carnistir thinks, and considers saying so. Then he realises that he should not pause to think for too long lest she think that he agrees with her.

'I don't agree', he says, to make it as clear as possible.

'Of course you think I'm pretty. I am your daughter so you are biased.' She pulls away from him.

And she is sullen again. Carnistir sighs.

His father said something once about temperamental children usually growing into parents of temperamental children. Carnistir hates it when he is proven right.

'I think that songs and poems are often utter rot when it comes to people', he says, picking words one by one like flowers, careful. 'Too many of them only describe some stereotypical ideals. Only maidens with dark hair and white skin and maidens with golden hair and dark skin, isn't that so? Only the extremes, somehow that is poetic or romantic or something. But it is not true at all that only women who look like that are beautiful.

'The truth is', he says, growing rather heated now, 'that people think all sorts of people are pretty or handsome and like all sorts of people. And just as true is that when one day you start thinking of… marrying sort of things...'

He realises that he has raised his voice. Perhaps that is good? Perhaps it will help Moriel believe him.

He carries on doggedly even though, as he utters each word, he fears failing her. 'When you meet someone you love, even then it doesn't matter what those over-decorated peacocks at court think a beautiful person looks like, or the over-romantic souls who write the popular songs.

'When it matters – when it is someone that matters to you, and you matter to them – that is the only time that your looks will matter –'

Too many matters, he thinks, yet carries on.

'Then they – that person – will not be measuring you up in their mind or summing up your flaws. They'll be looking at you and they'll see you and if they find your – your strong will and your keen eye and your vigilant care of your sister beautiful, then they'll find you beautiful.'

Moriel listens quietly, dark eyes intent on his, clutching a bent arrow in her hand still.

Carnistir ends, words still sticky on his tongue, with, 'What is to you beauty unseen will be blindingly bright for someone who loves you. As it already is to your mother and me.'

'Is that from a poem?' Moriel asks. 'From beauty unseen to blindingly bright.'

Carnistir can feel colour rise to his cheeks. 'No, it is just… the words that I arrived at when I thought about this.'

'You're always saying that you're not a poet. But you might be, secretly', Moriel says in the same tone as she might say an insult. It is hypocritical of her since she enjoys almost all music and much of poetry, too.

'I'm not a poet', Carnistir says. 'Only your father. And – and I'm not handsome', he adds. Tuilindien is always telling him not to say so but he has always believed in being honest to himself and about himself. 'But your mother loves me', he says to Moriel. 'The reason she did not marry me as soon as I'd have liked had nothing to do with what I look like, or it did in that way that only she can see.'

Moriel still looks dubious but she says, 'You are very happy. You and mama.'

'Yes, we are. Moriel, my darling, there is – I do not have good words for it but as I said there is a connection of spirits between friends and family that has little to do with looks and everything with, with what sort of a spirit you have.' The words are pouring out of him. 'If you like what a person's fëa is like you will like their hröa too. I never thought the Vanyar so beautiful before I met your mother.'

'I am brave', Moriel says, and she is, too foolhardy for even Carnistir's taste. 'I'm loyal like grandpapa Fëanáro is always saying we should be to our family and friends. I learn many things fast and I am a good sister to Vaniel and a good cousin to Tyelpë.'

'You are', Carnistir agrees, his chest tight at his brave girl's summary of herself. His lesson to her has become all muddled, but she seems to be taking some solace in it, and that is the important thing. 'You are smart and strong. Strength is beautiful, and skill.' Thinking of Moriel's patience and care with her baby sister, he adds, 'And kindness. A deeper beauty.'

'I also get grumpy too easily like you.' And she is honest like him, straight-spoken. 'But I know how to ask for forgiveness.'

'You have learned to do it much faster than I did.'

'You're a good teacher, papa.' Moriel pulls a grimy handkerchief out of her pocket and blows her nose on it. Carnistir makes a mental note to get her a clean one when they go inside.

She drops the bent arrow on the ground and picks up her bow. 'Let's shoot again.'

'Alright', Carnistir concedes. If Moriel doesn't have more to say, he doesn't know what to say either. 'Let us start by fetching the arrows you have shot so far.'

He goes to pull out the arrows Moriel managed to shoot into the targets while she searches around for the ones that fell short.

She sees that two embedded themselves into trees, and grimaces as she pulls them out.

'We will hear about this from the gardener and your mother both', Carnistir notes, grimacing as well.

He watches Moriel use all her strength to pull a stubbornly embedded arrow from a yavannamírë tree, the muscles in her bare forearms tensing.

'I know who you look like', he says. He doesn't know how he did not see it before.

With a hoop of victory and a few stumbling steps backwards, Moriel manages to pull out the arrow.

'Who?' she asks, bringing the arrows to their shooting line.

'My mother.' Even as Moriel begins protesting, Carnistir begins listing. 'You are tall and broad-shouldered, and nimble-fingered and strong-armed, and you have freckles you inherited from me and her. The different hair and skin is a small thing compared to all that. I believe that when you are grown and stand side by side with her, the resemblance will be remarkable.'

Moriel is quiet, the bunch of arrows still in her hand. 'I think I would like that. Especially if I will be as skilled as she is.'

'You will be. You have the same passion, and learning will be easier when you are naturally strong.'

As long as Moriel has known how to say it, she has been saying that she wants to be a smith. What kind of smith she intends to become changes every week, but the passion burns steady.

'Thank you, papa', Moriel says abruptly. 'I know you don't like talking about things like this and you think that mama is better at it. But sometimes I need… she is so nice; you know how she is. Sometimes it is too much for me.'

Carnistir clears his throat. 'Let's shoot twenty arrows, then we go inside for lunch. And then you need to talk with your mother, too, about whatever it is she wanted to talk to you about.'

Moriel stares at the targets, then turns to Carnistir with a grin, almost herself again. 'If I hit the farthest target on more than half of my tries, can I get two portions of dessert?'

He is too soft with her, he knows he is, yet he says, 'If you promise to eat enough actual lunch too.'

'I promise.'

She hits that target on all but one of her tries.

*

Part II

At dinner that evening, Moriel can see her mother stealing glances at her, probably to see if what was causing her restlessness earlier in the day has passed. Her mother is not much good at subtlety, and it doesn't take long for Moriel to grow tired of her concerned looks.

She puts down her spoon with too much of a clatter. 'Mama, I am all right', she says.

'Blurgh', says Vaniel who is getting acquainted with soup for the first time. She does not seem very impressed.

'I am glad if you are', mother says. 'Did the archery help, then?'

'Mm.' Moriel picks up her spoon and starts eating her soup again. It is good even if Vaniel doesn't think so. 'And papa and I talked.'

'You did?' Mother glances at father in that way they have. Moriel knows they are talking about her without saying anything.

'Don't do that', she grumbles. 'Please', she remembers to add though not before her mother's chastising look.

'Very well, I will ask you directly, then', mother acquiesces. 'Did talking with your papa help with whatever was on your mind?'

'It did.' Vaniel splashes at her soup, poking at it with a finger before father can stop her. Moriel gives her her dessert spoon to play with instead.

'I am glad', mother says again. 'There is something I have been meaning to talk to you about as well, Moriel dear.'

In her excitement, Moriel drops her spoon again. 'My name?'

She does not have a mother-name. She is unusually old for that but she hasn't minded it much so far, not really.

Many years ago mother asked her if it would be all right with her to wait a bit longer to see if she gets some special insight for a name, like mothers sometimes do, and Moriel said that it was. Then, a year ago, when she hadn't received any foresight or anything like that, mother had told Moriel of a name she'd thought of for her, a bird's name. Mother has a bird name – from tuilindo, swallow – and so do her sisters and many of their children.

She had asked, 'Do you like the name?' and Moriel had said no, because she didn't. It didn't feel like hers.

Mother had looked sad but said, 'Then it is not your name.'

'Maybe – maybe not a bird name', Moriel had said. She couldn't say why not, though; she didn't know. She does like birds.

Mother had accepted it. 'I will think of another kind of name, then. It will likely take some time. It turns out that I am very slow at naming children.'

Now mother says, with a smile at Moriel's enthusiasm, 'Yes, your name.'

'Tell me! Please', Moriel adds at a disapproving grunt from her father's direction.

Mother laughs and asks, 'Do you want to know right here and now, or wait until after dinner when we can talk, just you and I? Either way', she continues despite Moriel beginning to ask for her name now, 'please, mama'.

'Either way', mother says, 'you can refuse it if it doesn't feel like yours, and I will keep trying.'

'Now', says Moriel. She tries to keep from falling off her chair in her excitement.

(She is very old not to have a mother-name. Even Tyelpë, who is almost always nice and incidentally received his mother-name at one day old, has remarked on it.)

'Elerrína', says mother, her smile the same nervous one now that it is when she talks with grandpapa Fëanáro. 'I hope that perhaps you do not mind being named after a mountain?'

Elerrína is one of the names of Taniquetil, the holy mountain where mother grew up. Moriel thinks that it might be the least used one. She knows it only from songs, but she knows that it means 'crowned with stars'. Taniquetil is very high but not so high as to reach the stars, so it is a sort of poetic near-sensible name.

'Elerrína', Moriel says, testing the weight and shape of it on her tongue. It is longer and prettier than Moriel. It is similar in meaning if not form to aunt Tinweriel's name.

'For your freckles, my darling', mother says.

'Oh', says Moriel. She likes that. The name makes her freckles sound beautiful.

'I don't mind being named after a mountain', she says to her mother decisively. 'I want to be Elerrína. It's a mountain where Vanyar live and it's my Vanyarin name. Moriel is my Noldorin name.'

'You can take some time to decide which you prefer to be called.'

'I don't need time. I want to be called Moriel in Tirion and Elerrína on the plains and in Valmar and on Taniquetil. But you can always call me Moriel', she nods at her father, 'and mama, I like the way you say Elerrína, you can call me by it anywhere.'

'Being called by a different name in a different place is unconventional but it sounds like something that will fit you well', her mother. She gets up and comes to hug Moriel, pressing a kiss on her head. 'I am glad that you like the name', she whispers in her ear. 'I am sorry it took me so long to think of it.'

Moriel hugs her back. 'I didn't mind. I like being Moriel, too. Moriel Elerrína', she says, feeling out the combination. 'My name has rather a lot of r's.'

'Suits you', says father.

Moriel squints at him dubiously. She decides that she is too happy to get vexed.

Mother goes back to her own chair. 'I am already considering mother-names for Vaniel so that she might not have to wait as long', she says. 'I have learned, now, that I should not wait for any sort of foresight to inspire a name. It seems that that gift has passed me by though my father sometimes has inklings of things yet to happen.'

And from there mother and father launch into a long discussion about knowing things in advance of them happening. Moriel is not interested in it so she goes back to eating, tasting and savouring her new name along with every spoonful of soup.

'Elerrína, Elerrína', she whispers to herself. 'Star-crowned.'

'Sarrrb', says Vaniel.

'Quite so', Moriel agrees. 'Star-crowned.' She wipes mushed pea from Vaniel's cheek. Father is distracted with mother and not keeping much of an eye on Vaniel. It's alright; Moriel likes helping her during meals.

'I hope that mother will think of as pretty a name for you', Moriel says to her little sister.

*

A/N: In Names of insight, foresight, love I had Nerdanel asking her children whether they liked their mother-names before making the final choice of naming them thus. Tuilindien has the kind of nature where she would happily follow Nerdanel's example so I wrote her doing so.

Thank you for reading, I would love to hear what you guys thought about this!

[elesianne]

Tuilindien, wife of Caranthir, and her daughters Moriel and Líriwen made in this picrew

[elesianne]

Tuilindien! In the Vanyarin settlement on Taniquetil, dressed for a high feast day, probably before she married Caranthir.

Thank you @arofili for introducing me to this Elvish Character Creator; I am now obsessed.

(Netyarë)

[elesianne]

A Silmarillion fanfic, chapter one of three(?) – Carnistir/Tuilindien

Chapter length: ~2,400 words; Story rating: Teenage audiences

Some keywords: Pregnancy, Babies, Romance, Family, Angst and fluff 

Summary: Caranthir and his wife expect and welcome an addition to their family. Tuilindien's joy is greater than her exhaustion, but Caranthir's happiness is shadowed by Míriel's fate.

A/N: This continues where This life that we've created ended. The first chapter is the angstiest: the fic gets progressively happier.

At the end of the chapter, there is discussion on how I incorporate Tolkien's writings on the effects of childbearing for elven women in this fic.

Warnings for the whole fic: Pregnancy, obviously; very few physical details, but there is some discussion of how bearing a child mentally feels to an elven woman. Childbirth happens in the fic, but there is no  description of it.

Fëa = spirit, soul; hröa = body

AO3 LINK

*

Chapter I //  The shadow behind his shoulder

After the first day when she cries of joy several times when she realises that she is expecting, Tuilindien does not cry during her pregnancy. She is ecstatically happy, so happy that even days of feeling exhausted and unwell do little to dampen her mood.

'Do not worry', she tells Carnistir when he looks almost scared when he comes home and finds her resting on a settee again, for the fourth day in a row. 'This is completely normal.'

He pulls a chair next to her. There is nervousness, still, in his eyes; Tuilindien knows it is there because of Míriel. Though Fëanáro and Nerdanel had seven children, and Nerdanel is hale and well, there is still a fear in the hearts of Fëanáro and his sons that other Eldar do not have to bear.

Tuilindien takes Carnistir's hand. 'All will be well', she assures him. 'For me, and for Netyarë. You and Curvo worry for naught.'

'It didn't occur to my grandfather to worry, and he should have', is all that Carnistir says, though the dark clouds in him seem to subside a little.

'Your worrying will not help me, not that I need help in anything but in the completely normal process of us both supporting our child as they grow', Tuilindien says, for she thinks that in this matter as in many others it is best not to indulge his dark mood overmuch. She sits up. 'Come sit by me, my love, and talk to me without words, and I will speak to our child's fëa on your behalf.'

He comes, and holds her close. As their hearts beat together and their spirits hold conference, he rumbles aloud, 'I wish I could feel them already.'

Tuilindien smiles against his shoulder. Her hasty Noldo; but this time, she completely understands the impatience.

'Soon', she comforts him. 'By all accounts you'll feel them soon.'

'Have you felt anything new today?'

He asks that every day. Tuilindien hides another smile in the fine linen of his tunic. 'Not really', she says. 'There is little of anything definite to feel yet, anyway. Only very general sensations of… growth, and a will to grow and live. And some confusion. Netyarë told me she feels the same things.'

(Netyarë realised she was pregnant only seven weeks before Tuilindien. It has already brought the two of them much closer than before, talking about the strangeness and wonder of being with child, and all their hopes and expectations.)

'It must be confusing, being a fëa inside another's hröa', Carnistir muses. 'It is for the best that we don't remember it when we grow older.'

'Yes.' Finding herself too tired to think of things to say aloud, Tuilindien leans against her beloved and sends images and thoughts of love to him and their child alike.

She does not worry that anything unusual or dangerous will happen to her; she is too happy to worry, and besides, most women get through their pregnancy perfectly fine.

But behind Carnistir's shoulder there looms a silver-haired shadow Tuilindien doesn't know how to banish.

*

Tuilindien tries to make things for her child. Even though she has now lived for years among the Noldor who all seem to be talented in several crafts, she does not usually mind that she doesn't know how to do many tangible things beoynd basic baking, needlework and gardening.

Now it bothers her. She wants to be able to have her child surrounded by things of her own making, like they will be by the work of Carnistir's hands.

He started making furniture for the baby as soon as she told her of her pregnancy.

'I didn't know that you knew how to make so many kinds of furniture, too', she says as she watches him sketch a cradle, a special chair for the baby, and a rocking chair.

'I don't really', he says, frowning in concentration as he writes down measurements and materials. 'I'm extrapolating from what I know, just like Curufinwë is. Uncle Carion taught us both carpentry. I made a chair and a cabinet with him but I never studied it, really.'

He knows enough of the making of various sorts of things with wood and metal and stone, and has the right kind of mind to indeed extrapolate more, that he soon has the baby's room filled with furniture that Tuilindien finds quite well-made even if he sees many imperfections in them.

'The finish is uneven', he mutters to himself as he runs his hand over the rocking chair.

'It is beautiful', Tuilindien says firmly, sitting in it. 'And comfortable. Do not be so strict on yourself and your creations, Carnistir, my love.'

But she does not need to be strict with herself to see that whatever she tries to make for her child is no good at all.

First she tries to sew a little shirt. But though she manages to make her stitches good enough that they'll certainly hold, she estimates the proportions of a baby all wrong and when she, desolate, shows the shirt to Carnistir, he turns crimson from the effort it takes for him not to laugh.

'Perhaps it will fit Snowdrop or Cinder', he says, his mouth twitching, and then kisses her gently when she drops the shirt and sighs.

'Do not fret, my dear', he comforts her with an arm around her shoulders. 'You do not need to make clothes for the baby for them to know that you love them with all your heart. I'm sure that they know it already.'

'I do tell them hourly.' Tuilindien sighs again and leans on him unashamedly. Carnistir never minds it when she does, and she has all the right now that their child grows inside her and draws their strength from her.

'I'm going to try crocheting next', she decides. 'Netyarë's mother taught her. I'm sure Netyarë will be glad to teach me how to make a blanket.'

'Or you could just go to a tailor and seamstress, and whatever shops sell baby things, and order everything that our baby will need', Carnistir says.

But Tuilindien has it in her to be a little stubborn in this matter. 'I will try crocheting', she repeats.

Netyarë is glad to teach her, and Tuilindien does manage all right as long as they sit side by side and she can follow what Netyarë's nimble fingers are doing. As soon as she goes home and tries to continue on her own, her creation turns into a tangled mess.

Tuilindien sighs deep again, and does give the mangled mess of a tiny blanket to their cats to play with or just destroy.

To Netyarë she says, 'I must give up on these pursuits before my in-laws who are skilled and talented in so many things get too much cause to make fun of me. But I enjoyed spending afternoons with you; could we continue it?'

Netyarë smiles her bright smile. 'By all means, let us continue', she says. 'I have enjoyed it, too, getting to know you better and spending time with you. It is silly that it took being with child at the same time for us to become friends.'

'It is', Tuilindien agrees. 'I am very glad that we have. I would be much more nervous if I did not have someone going through this at the same time as I am.'

Netyarë lays a hand on her stomach, visibly larger now. Tuilindien's is still almost hidden by her flowy dresses.

'It is very strange, isn't it?' Netyarë says. She smiles, twinkling, mischievous. 'You must not tell Curufinwë that I told you first, he would be very upset, but – I think I know now that I am going to have a boy.'

'Really?' Tuilindien's cheeks hurt with how wide she smiles. 'That is wonderful, Netyarë.' For her sister-in-law is obviously pleased.

'I am certain that Curvo is going to think it very wonderful, too', Netyarë says drily, but smiles still. 'I am going to tell him today, though I am not yet absolutely sure.'

'How could you be?' Tuilindien says. 'As you said, it is all so very strange to feel.'

'The strangest thing I have ever felt in my body', Netyarë agrees.

Tuilindien cannot wait to share the strange feelings with Carnistir; for him to feel their little one's fëa too.

*

The day he does, one morning when they are lying in bed late as usual, talking quietly, he goes pale and then red, and is silent for a long time. Tuilindien lays carefully still, her head on his bicep, his hand on her stomach.

This is stranger than anything before, she thinks as she lies there and tries to relax. She cannot directly feel, or hear, Carnistir listening to and reaching out to the baby's fëa.

But she can feel Carnistir's mood and the surface of his shifting, growing emotions in the connection of their spirits, as usual; he is not hiding it from her. He barely ever does.

And she can feel their child's fëa inside her reacting to something that isn't herself for the first time, pulsing with that small strength and bright light that Tuilindien can somehow see even though she of course cannot.

'Tuilindien', is all that Carnistir says, wonder in his low, cracked voice.

Tuilindien turns her head to his chest and kisses him there, telling him without words how much she loves her, and how glad she is that he can finally feel the little spirit, too, and talk to them and support them as they grow.

She lies there and feels the warmth of her husband and her child, the pale golden light of the morning from the large windows surrounding them all, and she thinks that she could never have asked for more happiness than this.

*

Unfortunately feeling the spirit of their child doesn't lessen Carnistir's worry about Tuilindien. His face and mood still darken whenever he finds her resting, not angry but so worried that the concern often turns to impotent anger at not being able to help – not being able to guarantee her safety. He is ferocious even in his worry.

When she does something a little bit strenuous and doesn't go to rest right after, he hovers around her like a stormy-browed mother hen until she does.

'You know that I never mind lying in your arms, my love, but you did not need to coax me to bed just because I went riding outside the city with the twins', she tells him one day, exasperated. 'We did not even go far.'

He holds onto her tighter, his forehead against hers in a gentle touch as they lie on their sides in bed, facing each other, breathing the same air, their thoughts mingling.

'Just until dinner', Carnistir says, voice quieter than his spirit.

She indulges him, resting there with him as long as he wants. It is good for all three of them to rest together like this, though lately Tuilindien feels like she does little else besides rest.

Carnistir's worrying gets tiresome on some days but there has not been an expecting mother better taken care of by her husband than she is, Tuilindien is certain. He plans their days around her comfort, fetches her things and makes sure she has the food she likes best and takes care of as many of her errands as he can; and he sends her constant love and comfort with such force that her spirit sings with it.

She does not worry about her strength running out, even though she is more tired than ever. She has him, and so much joy in their little one already. They sustain her.

Yet Carnistir seems unable to believe it, to trust in her strength, no matter how much she tries to reassure him.

'Do you think that I am weak?' she asks quietly as they lie there in the silvering light. 'You worry much more about me than Curufinwë appears to worry about Netyarë. Do you think that because I am gentle and… not so fire-hearted, not so passionate or opinionated as your family, or Netyarë, that bearing a child might take too much out of me?'

'Even if Curvo was deathly afraid, he would show little of it.' That is Carnistir's only reply.

Tuilindien feels tendrils of dark shame from him, either because he does think her weak or because he is refusing to answer her question for some other reason.

'It is not like you to avoid answering my questions', she tells him gently, though her patience is fraying.

He kisses her forehead in apology. Confusing thoughts flows from him to her as he thinks on his answer, attempting to tame the confusion.

'I do not think that you are weak, Tuilë', he begins, and thankfully it is easy for her to hear the truth in that. 'But you are like Míriel in some ways. My grandfather describes her as gentle, though also swift in her speech and her craft, and obstinate even against the exhortations of the Valar.'

'Of those I am only gentle', Tuilindien says.

'You can be obstinate', her beloved argues. 'In your own, quiet way. Míriel was like that too.'

It is strange, hearing someone spoken of in the past tense like that, knowing that they will not come back, that there is no future tense because they are refusing re-embodiment. Tuilindien's frustration melts at that reminder of the strange fate of Carnistir's grandmother – the strangeness, uniqueness of his family – and she sighs against his warm skin.

'I may be like Míriel, then, but I cannot imagine wanting to leave you', she whispers, something constricting painfully around her heart. 'Or our child whom I already love so much that it hurts. I cannot imagine it, however much I try. That is why I have no fear.'

Carnistir is quiet for a moment, a miasma of emotions swirling in him and to her. 'I doubt Míriel had either.'

'I promise, Carnistir, I promise, I will not leave you', and to her own ears she sounds desperate and not the least bit reassuring, and she clings to him with body and spirit. But he seems to breathe easier after that, and slips to a restful state before she does.

Apparently making a promise that she thought did not need to be spoken aloud because it is so obvious to her was exactly what he needed to find peace.

Tuilindien rests better, too, for having him calm in her arms, and the little fëa inside her rests too.

*

A/N: *apologetically mumbles something about being constitutionally unable of not writing something slightly ominous about Fëanorians and promises in every other fic*

Note on canon for this fic: For the most part, in this fic series, I am faithful to Tolkien's canon. However in this fic I deviate from some of the things Tolkien wrote down in his essay Laws and Customs among the Eldar (published in History of Middle-Earth X: Morgoth's Ring).

This is because I dislike the extent of how spiritually taxing Tolkien writes the bearing of a child being on elven mothers. Because of Míriel being such close kin to Carnistir and a spectre that haunts him during Tuilindien's pregnancy, I've incorporated some aspects of it in this fic – but not all.

What I dislike, and do not include in my 'fic-verse', is that the power of creation in elven women goes mainly into their children while men create more other things. I take the view that yes, having a child is more spiritually draining for elven mothers than it is for humans, but they recover from it and they can create just as much beautiful art and music and works of science and whatever as men, even after having many children. So the mother's fëa is not partially spent or exhausted on her children, except Míriel's who is an exception in this matter.

*

Thank you for reading! I would love hearing what you think of this fic.

[elesianne]

A Silmarillion fanfic, chapter four of four – Carnistir/Tuilindien – COMPLETE

Chapter length: ~3,400 words; Story rating: Teenage audiences

A/N: More names than usual in this chapter because I write Fëanáro calling all his sons by their father-names even though Curufinwë is the only one who prefers it. All their names can be found here if you need a reminder.

AO3 LINK

*

Chapter IV //  Daughter of Fëanáro’s line

When his family arrives, Carnistir gives them a stern lecture about behaving quietly and doing as he and Tuilindien say. He slips into the bedroom before letting them in to ask Tuilindien once more whether she is ready.

'I am', she says, a little irritated with him by now. 'Now take your daughter and tell your family her name.'

Carnistir picks Moriel out of her cot. She is awake but calm, a perfect state for her to meet new people.

Do not mind it if they are loud, he tells her silently as he walks to the door. They mean well.

He takes a deep breath, opens the door and says, 'This is Moriel.'

Instantly there is too much noise, and Carnistir covers Moriel's little ears and scowls at his family. 'Come in, but only if you can be quiet.'

Tyelkormo and Curufinwë roll their eyes as they come into the room. It suits Curufinwë particularly badly because he is holding his own baby. Netyarë tugs at Curufinwë's sleeve, and they go to talk to Tuilindien.

Without hesitation, Carnistir passes Moriel to his mother's arms first. 'Your granddaughter', he says, watching his parents' faces fill with light.

'Little Moriel', Nerdanel breathes with a wide smile.

Fëanáro doesn't smile, but his eyes are almost too bright for joy only. 'Welcome to the family, Moriel', he says. He caresses her round cheek, touches her black curls. 'You gave her a good name, Morifinwë.'

Carnistir wants to snort but knows that his father would look down his nose at him for it. 'It is the most obvious, least creative name that I could have chosen.'

'Not everything has to be complicated.' The corner of Fëanáro's mouth twitches as he says that.

'Though things in this family tend to be', Nerdanel agrees. She smiles down at a curious Moriel. 'She is beautiful, Carnistir, a strong little girl.'

'Tuilindien says that she is going to grow up tall and strong', Carnistir says. Watching his parents' happiness at meeting his child makes him feel warm. 'Like you', he adds a little belatedly. His mother is taller and much stronger than most women.

'I'm sure she will', Fëanáro says, eyes fixed on Moriel. 'Can I hold her, Nerdanel?' he asks.

With an indulgent smile Nerdanel lets Fëanáro lift Moriel into his own arms. 'Come meet your niece, boys', she calls to Carnistir's brothers. 'In an orderly manner', she adds as the Pityo steps on Maitimo's toes in his hurry to meet the baby.

Relaxing because his mother has his brothers under control and Moriel does not appear to be to alarmed by all the new people, Carnistir takes a step back. He sees that Tinweriel is now talking with Tuilindien and Netyarë, the three of them laughing at something that Carnistir cannot make out over the excited voices of the twins and the rain still falling in heavy sheets outside the windows.

Curufinwë appears at Carnistir's side, so suddenly that Carnistir swears.

'Don't sneak around', he tells his most annoying brother that he has actually grown somewhat close with during the year that both of them were fathers-to-be. They have had more in common than ever before.

'You named your child Moriel, Morifinwë?' Curufinwë sneers but it is probably playful. His sneer melts into a smile as he looks at their gaggle of brothers gathered around their father holding Moriel.

Carnistir raises his brows so high it is actually uncomfortable. 'You gave your son your own name.'

'It's traditional!'

'For you and for father, mostly. Most others do not give the exact same name to their child.'

'Shush, your cantankerousness will scare your little one.'

But Moriel is not cranky – if she were, she would make it known, and everyone in the room would hear it – and neither is Curufinwë or Carnistir, really.

'She is a sweet child, Moryo', Curufinwë says, his shrewd eyes almost as soft as when he speaks of his own child.

'She's very loud when she makes noise', Carnistir says, wondering why he can never go without arguing back at Curufinwë.

'Of course she is – she is your daughter after all.'

Curufinwë dodges Carnistir's friendly shove, the swift little weasel. 'They'll be good friends, probably, your daughter and my son', Curufinwë says. 'They are so close in age. They will learn things at the same pace, and they can take lessons together.'

'They'll be good friends or they might not get along. Being related and close in age is no guarantee of being close friends. Just look at me and Tyelko.'

'How can you be so curmudgeonly when you have a four-day-old baby, cuter than you could have reasonably hoped for, and a happy wife who is well and even tolerates all of us bursting in here at once?' Curufinwë rolls his eyes again.

Carnistir decides to answer honestly. 'Out of old habit.'

'Do try to get rid of that habit. Now, we were talking about our children.' Curufinwë makes a face as if that sounds as incongruous in his ears as it does in Carnistir's. 'You and Tyelko had to live under the same roof. I hope that Moriel and my little Curufinwë will get along better since they don't have to. It won't be a problem if one of them is noisy in the mornings and the other wants to start the day quietly.'

'I hope so too', Carnistir says, not against his habit of always speaking the truth.

*

Tuilindien watches from her place in bed as each member of Carnistir's family admire Moriel and exclaim over her in turn, each in their own way. Tyelkormo makes a show of counting Moriel's fingers to make sure she has the right number of them; Netyarë coos to her and moves Tyelperinquar's little fist as if in a wave to his cousin; the twins are not as spellbound as they were with Tyelperinquar when they first saw him, but still amazed at a brother of theirs having a child of his own.

Netyarë and Tinweriel take the seats Carnistir has set by the bed and ask her how she is, how Moriel has been, all the questions that people, women especially, ask of a new mother. Tuilindien asks to hold Tyelperinquar and with a smile, Netyarë gives him to her.

He is awake and alert and looks at Tuilindien with his grey eyes wide as she holds him before her against her bent knees and smiles at him. He is paler-skinned and lighter-haired than Moriel with his mid-grey eyes and dark brown hair; he is very much the kind of Noldo that lived in Tuilindien's mind as the typical Noldo before she got to know so many of them that the abstract version in her mind has all but disappeared.

'Hello, Tyelpë dear', Tuilindien says to him, and he coos, as if in answer. 'There is now a playmate for you: a little cousin, barely littler than you.'

Netyarë laughs. 'She may grow up to be taller than him, if Tyelpë takes after me.' Netyarë is by far the shortest in the room full of her in-laws, and indeed most rooms.

Tuilindien smiles. 'We shall see.' She turns to Tinweriel. Makalaurë has appeared to stand behind her, hand on her shoulder. 'Will you sing at Moriel's naming ceremony?'

'Of course', both of them say almost at the same time, as pleased to be asked as they are every time.

Suddenly almost everyone is gathering around the bed. Moriel has ended up in Fëanáro's experienced arms that bounce her back to calmness when she fusses a little.

The twins give way to their father so he can stand behind Netyarë. Tuilindien tries not to tense so much that it is visible; Carnistir makes the twins make space for him too. He doesn't bother to hide being on guard.

'How are you, Tuilindien?' Fëanáro asks.

Instinctively, Carnistir takes a step closer. His father talking to her usually doesn't end well even if it begins well.

'I am well, thank you', Tuilindien replies. 'Tired, but Carnistir is taking good care of me.'

'And you are recovering your strength?'

If the question came from anyone else, Tuilindien would interpret its tone as concern. Perhaps, with the shadow of Míriel on them all but most of all on Fëanáro, it is concern. 'I am', she says. 'Little by little. Thank you for asking.'

'That is good.' Fëanáro bounces Moriel gently again. 'Carnistir, stop hovering so close. I can feel your breath at the back of my head.'

Carnistir doesn't apologise but takes half a step back. Tuilindien smiles at him and tells him as clearly as she can without speaking that everything is well; it is.

Fëanáro gazes down at Moriel as intently as he would a piece of unfinished work, or a puzzle he is trying to solve. She blinks at him, growing drowsy. Fëanáro turns to Carnistir and says, 'She has the same colour eyes as you had when you were born, Carnistir. My mother's eyes.'

Tuilindien feels Carnistir's surprise at that. He says, 'I thought her eyes were like Tyelko's. Light.'

'No. Turkafinwë resembles her most out of all of you in most ways, his hair most notably, but her eyes were dark, as dark as yours.'

Carnistir swallows heavily. 'I did not know.'

For the first time that Tuilindien has ever seen, Fëanáro smiles a little mockingly at no one else, just himself. He says, 'Because I rarely speak of her, as does my father. Most of what you know – all of you – you have pieced together from things you have heard from people who were not so close to her.'

More quietly, melodiously, Fëanáro says, 'She had silver hair and swift hands and dark eyes, and she was the jewel of her father's eye and thus named Míriel, jewel-daughter. Little Moriel –' and he smiles again, in the way that Tuilindien is coming to recognise as the way he smiles at his grandchildren, '– is the jewel of a daughter in our family.'

It is the softest side of Fëanáro that Tuilindien has ever seen and though she is happy to see it, there is in her heart a little piercing pain in her heart. She thinks, this is how he can be with his family when I am not there; this is how he is capable of being with everyone else but me.

But giving birth to his granddaughter seems to have earned Tuilindien a respite from Fëanáro's coldness.

He and Nerdanel are the last to leave, tarrying beside the bed after giving Moriel to Tuilindien. She had become restless and nothing would soothe her but laying against her mother's chest.

While Carnistir talks to his mother of some practical matters, Fëanáro takes a seat in the chair closest to Tuilindien and says, 'Thank you for the name, Tuilindien.'

He rarely speaks her name out loud.

'Carnistir chose Moriel's name', she replies, confused.

'Yes, I know. I also know that he would not have named your first daughter after himself without asking for your consent. I appreciate that you gave it to him.' Fëanáro touches Moriel's hand once more. 'She would have liked the name too, my mother whose name Moriel's echoes. She would have been proud for a daughter of her line to bear it.'

Tuilindien does not ask how he knows that even though he barely knew his mother. Sometimes one just knows some things about people, with a certainty of the heart if not the mind; and young children have the strongest connection to their parents.

'I am glad to hear it', Tuilindien says. And she is.

Fëanáro stands up abruptly. 'I wish you a speedy recovery', he says. 'Do invite my father to see her soon. He is very impatient, even more than Nerdanel's parents.'

'In a few days', Tuilindien promises. 'And then he can begin arrangements for the naming ceremony so in a few weeks' time, all of our friends and relatives can meet Moriel.'

Fëanáro gives her a sharp nod and turns just as sharply to leave.

Tuilindien is tired but her heart is light as she pats Moriel's back and promises her silently that she can get her meal just as soon as Nerdanel is done chatting with Carnistir.

She smiles and whispers to Moriel, breathing in the sweet baby smell of her, 'You are my jewel-daughter, and my flower-daughter, half-Noldo and half-Vanya that you are.'

*

Already before she opens her eyes, Tuilindien knows that he is there like he has been constantly these past few days, his strength that supports her surrounding her as clear as the dip in the mattress beside her. She is glad he is resting in bed and not in that chair he took up residence in for the first two days of Moriel's life.

'Carnistir', she mumbles, opening her eyes and lifting herself up on her elbows. When she sees that Moriel is in Carnistir's arms, coming slowly to wakefulness just like Tuilindien herself, she relaxes back onto the mattress. She doesn't need to check up on the baby. Carnistir is looking after her and will pass her on to Tuilindien to be fed when it is needed.

Tuilindien allows herself to close her eyes again, just for a little moment longer, turning her cheek to the soft pillow. Her husband and child are quiet, the only thing she can hear Moriel's small sleepy snuffling.

For a time at least. When Tuilindien yawns and rubs at her eyes, Carnistir asks, 'Are you well this morning? Recovering from meeting all of my family yesterday?'

So he hasn't stopped worrying yet. 'Quite well', she replies.

Carnistir's face is tense but his fingers stroking half-sleepy Moriel's little arm couldn't be gentler. 'You know why I worry every time you fall to sleep. You sleep so much still. Every time you fall asleep, a part of me is still afraid that you won't wake up', he admits.

Because Míriel died in her sleep, without a sound but a sigh. Tuilindien tries not to shiver at the thought. She is not afraid of passing from Irmo's realm to Námo's while she rests, but Carnistir's worry weighs her down all the same. She is so very sorry for him that he cannot enjoy this precious early time with their daughter like she can, without any worries.

The fear in his eyes that he bears as Fëanáro's son and Míriel's grandson has faded, lessened, but it is still there, not quite masked by the joy that Moriel has brought.

'Five days, Carnistir, it has been five days since I gave birth to Moriel. And there is healing in Irmo's realm for me.' Trying for levity, she asks, 'Will you not stop worrying before Moriel is a woman grown?

Carnistir grimaces. 'Not until the last of our children is grown, I expect.' He bends down to give her a soft kiss, a brush of his lips, and it is an apology. 'I promise you, Tuilë, as you have promised me not to leave us, that I trust in your strength more every day, slow though my progress is.'

Tuilindien sits up to take a sip of water. 'Thank you, my love. I know that you always keep your promises.'

At that moment Moriel whimpers and then opens her mouth and begins crying as loud as she can, making both of her parents flinch and her little face scrunch up and redden. They can tell, both by the sound of the cry and the need they can feel in her fëa, that she is hungry.

As fast as she can, Tuilindien unbuttons the wide straps of her nightgown that she had made specially for nursing, and Carnistir gives Moriel to her to nurse.

Carnistir rubs his ears. 'I truly hope that she does not get any louder as she grows older.'

'We should have been listening to her more closely instead of worrying other things so that we could have felt it before she needed to start wailing', Tuilindien says distractedly as she tries to find just the right way to hold Moriel so that she will latch. After a moment of trying she does, and Tuilindien leans her head back and closes her eyes in relief.

'I will go get breakfast for you', Carnistir says suddenly.

'And for yourself', Tuilindien reminds him.

'Of course.'

He gathers a few scattered clothes from around the room to take them to be laundered while Tuilindien hides a smile. There is no of course about him remembering to feed himself too; he forgets most of the time, lost in the rhythm of taking care of his wife and child.

While he is gone to fetch food, Tuilindien peers out the window as well as she can from her place in bed with her child nursing at her breast. It looks like the rain has finally stopped, though drops still keep falling down from the roof.

She can hear some birdsong, too, besides the sound of water, and that makes her come to a little decision while she moves Moriel over to her other breast. Tuilindien sings to her quietly as she nurses: a lullaby of birds in the spring, building nests in the fragrant trees on the mountainside, gathering many kinds of things to make them perfect for their little ones.

When Carnistir returns, arms laden with several plates of food and a jug in each hand, Tuilindien says, 'When we have eaten, we'll go into the garden. I am grown tired of this one room, I miss birdsong, and I want to show Moriel the outside world.'

And then she says, as he looks for places to set down the food and drink in the room that has again become messy, 'Thank you, my love, for bringing all of this. I didn't mean to be ungrateful by asking for more at once.'

'Don't worry about that, Tuilë, just tell me where to –'

'Just set it on my legs. I'll be still.'

He does put down the last plate on her legs and then sits down and says, 'Vanimelda, I'm not sure if the garden is…' He seems to remember his promise. After a pause during which he pours them both a cup of water he says, 'You must let me carry you.'

Tuilindien laughs. 'If you carry me, who will carry Moriel? No, my stubborn love, you will carry the baby and I will walk. It's hardly a longer distance to walk to the nearest bench than the three rounds around this room that I successfully did last night. The fresh air and brighter light will give me strength rather than sap it.'

Carnistir's black brows draw tight as he thinks, but he must come to the conclusion that her desire to end her bedrest is a good thing. 'Very well. But we will take blankets into the garden. I do not want either of you to get cold.'

'Of course we will take a blanket for Moriel, and for me too if you wish, but it is spring already, Carnistir, and warm now that the rain has finally passed.' Tuilindien hands him the baby to be burped – he has become the expert on it – and smiles again as she picks up the plate on her legs. Smiles come so easy to her these days.

'Moriel is our spring child', she says. 'I am sure she will like it out in the garden.'

The rain has indeed stopped though the garden is still wet. The touch of wet grass dampens the hem of Tuilindien's dressing gown within seconds, darkening it, and the spring-courting calls of birds in the trees is accompanied by the sound of water dripping from the bud-bearing branches.

Tuilindien does not mind. She stops at the nearest bench, as she promised Carnistir, and pulls him close to kiss him. She sighs against his lips, and then, after a quick kiss to Moriel's cheek too, she turns her face to the wind from the mountains and the golden light from Calacirya.

Together with Carnistir she grins watching Moriel, in his safe hold, blink wide-eyed at the wider world and brighter light.

*

A/N: This is it for this baby fic but this is not, if I can help it, my last fic about Carnistir and Tuilindien and their family. I have at least one happy fic planned, and then a monstrously long angst-filled fic about the unrest of the Noldor, darkening of Valinor and flight of the Noldor from this couple’s POV. But who knows when I can finish those...

If you want an email when I post a new fic in the Fëanorian marriages series, subscribe to the series on AO3.

Especially because this is the last chapter, I would love to hear what you think of it and the whole fic <3

[elesianne]

A Silmarillion fanfic, chapter two of three – Carnistir/Tuilindien

Chapter length: ~3,600 words; Story rating: Teenage audiences

Summary: Caranthir and his wife expect and welcome an addition to their family. Tuilindien’s joy is greater than her exhaustion, but Caranthir’s happiness is shadowed by Míriel’s fate.

A/N: In this longer chapter, an elven pregnancy continues to require a great deal of cuddling and fluff.

Warnings: Pregnancy continues, and there is exactly one sentence that is descriptive about childbirth in this chapter.

AO3 LINK

*

Chapter II //  In happy expectation

'I think our child is a girl', Tuilindien tells Carnistir one night, after a day of pondering about it quietly.

It has been another one of those days when she has done little but wander around the house and garden, doing only some tiny chores and taking her time with them, and sitting or lying down in warm, comfortable places like a contented cat. Indeed, Snowdrop and Cinder had joined her for some of her moments of rest, and she petted their soft fur while she conversed with her child's spirit, learning more about her.

Carnistir's puts down his utensils by his plate, and his face lights up. But as always when she tells him something about their child, he asks, 'Are you certain? How can you tell?'

'I am not certainly not certain', Tuilindien replies with a little laugh. Almost always, she has to tell him that she is not certain. 'This is new to me, Carnistir. But there is something about her that… I do not how to describe it. Some part of her spirit that resembles a part of mine, and it makes me think that she is a girl. I cannot explain it any better than that.'

'You are calling them 'her' now.' Carnistir smiles wider than she's ever seen.

He appears to be as elated about having a daughter as Curufinwë is about having a son.

'I might be wrong', she warns him. 'We have no way of knowing for certain whether I am until she is born. Though you may begin to feel more things about her soon, too.'

'I hope I will.' Somehow, he manages to frown while still also smiling. It is a peculiar sight, and it makes her heart ache in that sweet way only he can cause. 'I feel so little from her yet. Oh, Tuilë. A little girl.' He gets up and starts pacing around the dining room, only to come back to her after a few laps of the room to press a swift kiss to her forehead. Then he gets back to pacing.

Tuilindien starts eating her vegetables again. She is very hungry, and there is only joy to be felt from Carnistir. Apparently he cannot physically contain it all, and must move around. Tuilindien does not share the impulse but after years of marriage, she expected nothing else from him.

She eats and he paces, and when she is finishing her dessert he comes back to the table and sits down in the chair next to her.

His hair is messy from running his hands through it. Tuilindien runs careful fingers through the black locks, untangling knots, caressing his joyful fëa with hers.

She can tell that he is talking to their child, and so Tuilindien waits quietly until he speaks.

His hand on her belly, he asks, 'Do you think she will like making physical things or drawing plans for them like me, or studying intangible things like you?'

'I cannot tell yet.' She leans back in her chair. 'She will be her own person, her spirit all her own, so she might not take after either of us unless she chooses to and we choose to teach her.'

'I'll teach her anything she wants, or find teachers. If she wants to be a stone-smith, I won't let anyone say anything to her about how it is not woman's work. And in any case there are more and more women in Tirion working stone now than there were when my mother was young and considered odd for choosing it.'

Despite his fierce words, his calloused fingers are gentle as always. Tuilindien runs her own on top his for a moment.

'Perhaps she will be an artist', she says. 'Or a singer, or poet.'

Carnistir says, 'Perhaps she will be a needlewoman.'

She smiles at him. 'Perhaps. Nimble-fingered and capable of putting together something beautiful out of tiny stiches.'

She is glad that as her pregnancy has continues and their child become more and more real and present to them, Míriel's shadow has seemed to weigh less on Carnistir's spirit. Perhaps one day she will not be such at all.

Not today, though, not yet. For as Tuilindien finishes her dessert, her worrying husband says, 'Let's go to bed, Tuilë.'

'It is not late', she protests, but she doesn't really mind. She is already letting him help her up – unnecessarily – and she follows him when he leads her straight to their bedroom.

*

Tuilindien helps Netyarë paint both their nurseries. That is, she helps Netyarë's maid Wirien with covering the floors and mixing paints and plaster and other small errands. Wirien is skilled in them all, experienced in helping her mistress, and could probably do all of them alone just as well. Tuilindien suspects that Netyarë invited her just to make her feel included.

She doesn't voice her suspicions because she is happy to be included, although once Netyarë gets started painting, she needs little help. She appears to sink into her own world.

Tuilindien brings chairs to the nursery and she and Wirien sit down to keep Netyarë unneeded company and offer suggestions on the rare occasions when she asks for them. Tuilindien reads practise analyses by her young students and makes corrections in them, and Wirien does her household's mending.

It is all very companionable.

The walls in the room of her own baby Netyarë covers in depictions of small, fluffy rabbits gambolling in a woodland scene. When Curufinwë and Carnistir are shown the finished frescoes, they tease Netyarë about her subject matter, about how she has never painted anything nearly as whimsical before.

Netyarë turns up her little nose and says mock-haughtily that she has never painted frescoes in a child's bedroom before and, really, few artists have – her and Curufinwë's son is a lucky boy to have art in his room that is as carefully painted, and with more love, than the walls of any lord's room that Netyarë has been commissioned to decorate.

Curufinwë kisses her cheek in a rare public show of affection and says that, yes, their son is very lucky to have such a talented artist as his mother.

Carnistir studies the baby rabbits with a thoughtful frown and says resolutely, 'I think you painted their ears a little too long, and they are behaving too nicely with each other.'

While Netyarë rolls her eyes, Tuilindien whispers in Carnistir's ear, 'Neither of those things is really important for the purpose of the painting.'

'The purpose?'

'To delight a child.'

Carnistir starts to redden. 'Right', he says. 'This is one of those things I didn't think about enough before I spoke.'

Tuilindien pats his arm.

'I grew up in the city and am far from an expert on forestland fauna', Netyarë says. Fortunately she looks more amused than irritated. 'If you want a perfectly anatomically accurate depiction of an animal, ask Tyelko to draw you one.'

Curufinwë chuckles, makes a face at Carnistir and throws his arm around Netyarë's shoulders, and they all go to dinner.

The next day, Netyarë begins painting a fresco in the nursery of Tuilindien and Carnistir's daughter. At Tuilindien's request, Netyarë paints no bunnies or other small animals.

Instead, she paints a beautiful fresco of the two Trees on one of the windowless walls, more shimmering and bright than Tuilindien dared to hope for, and Taniquetil on the other: Tuilindien's home until she made her home here with Carnistir.

'I want her to get to know her other home, too, when she is still young and we won't be able to travel with her to Valinor or Taniquetil often', Tuilindien explains to Carnistir as they stand, hand in hand, looking at the half-finished fresco of the Holy Mountain one evening when Netyarë has laid down her brushes and plaster and gone home. A cold autumn wind blows in through the windows, and a fresh underlayer of plaster waits on the wall, drying, to be painted over the next few days.

Carnistir gives her a soft peck on the cheek and strokes gently over her crown of braids. Tuilindien can tell that he doesn't know what to say.

That is alright. Her mother is coming to visit soon.

*

'She feels a lot like you', Tuilindien says suddenly one day when they are again lying in bed already though it is barely night-time yet. She had been tired, and Carnistir managed to coax her into bed and then slipped in after her.

It is early still but he wanted to just lay there with his hand on her stomach, waiting for the baby to kick. He only began to feel her doing so a few days ago, and it is still new and wonderful. Perhaps it will not stop being wonderful, feeling their child's hröa as well as fëa. Tuilindien has been feeling it longer, and still stops and smiles dreamily whenever she does. She says that her heart caught fire when she first felt the baby moving inside of her.

'Does she really feel like me?' Carnistir asks, a little hesitant. It has not occurred to him that their child reminds might resemble him greatly; his first, intuitive, hoped-for image of her has always been a golden-haired girl with Tuilindien's eyes and gentle smile.

It might not be a good thing for Tuilindien's strength if their child is more like him. He is too much like his father in some ways, though too little in others.

'Yes, she does.' Tuilindien sighs, and Carnistir feels it bodily, nestled as he is against her back with his arm thrown over her waist, cradling the bump of her stomach. It did not sound like an unhappy sigh.

'I feel like she's going to be tall and strong', Tuilindien continues dreamily. 'Strong in the ways that you are.'

Carnistir starts. 'Is that… can you feel that in her fëa? Or is it a wish? Or foresight?'

Tuilindien mulls the question over. 'The first of those, I think', she says at length. 'Though if it is, how is it different from foresight? But I never had foresight before.'

'Many don't until they have children', Carnistir reminds her. He doesn't wish for foresight for Tuilindien, or for himself. It is a double-edged blade that can bring grief before its time as well as joy of things to come.

Tuilindien sighs again. Carnistir thinks that she is much more tired today than she has admitted to him. He can see it in her spirit. Their daughter, on the other hand, is in an unusually lively mood. He tries to tell her, gentle as he can, to calm down and let her mother rest, but it does not seem to be having much effect.

He never knows whether he is doing things right when he communicates with their daughter's spirit. Or perhaps she is indeed like him, restless too often.

He also doesn't want to risk making himself or Tuilindien sad by talking more about foresight so he returns to what she said about their child feeling like. He says, 'You are on the tall side too.'

'Not like you', Tuilindien argues softly. 'Not tall and strong, with your wide shoulders and big hands. And I don't have your physicality, your hands that touch a thing that was made by another's hands and know at once how it was done, or your eyes that follow someone's movements and then you can replicate them perfectly .' She runs a hand down his arm. 'You have a kind of connection to the physical world that I don't', she muses.

He clears his throat, both pleased and embarrassed and a little uneasy at this reminder of their differences. 'And is that what you sense from our daughter?'

She lays her hand on top of his on her stomach like she likes to do. 'Yes.'

'She will be a craftswoman, then.'

With a smile in her voice, Tuilindien says, 'She will. Perhaps a stone-smith. She will be strong enough for it.'

He smiles into the back of her neck. Her curls tickle his nose. 'I hope she has your hair.' It is not the first time he has said that.

'I hope she has your dark eyes.' Tuilindien is mumbling by now.

Carnistir kisses her nape and tells her, 'Rest, vanimelda, you need to rest so you can stay strong as our daughter grows strong, too.'

He is relieved when she doesn't protest this time.

She sighs once more, soft and sweet. 'I am glad you are here, Carnistir.'

'Of course I am', he says, confused.

'You are taking such good care of me', she continues, though he wishes she would just rest, and communicates that wish to her over their mental connection. 'You spend most of your time taking care of me and the baby now. And you carry me to bed when I let you now that I'm getting heavy and clumsy – even though I'm heavy indeed now; getting me all my favourite foods, even cooking yourself when you think the cook doesn't do a good enough job.'

She chuckles at that, and Carnistir blushes but regrets nothing. She adds, 'And you keep telling me, day after day, never tiring of it, how much you love me.'

'I don't do it every day.'

'Perhaps not in words. In actions, certainly many times a day. My stalwart strength.' She turns to face him, slow and clumsy, and kisses him.

In kissing she is far from clumsy, and it makes him hold her differently, breathe her in differently, tighten his hand on her waist, show his love to her with his body.

*

After Tuilindien told Carnistir's family that she is with child, Fëanáro seemed to accept her – really accept her – as a member of his family for the first time.

Carnistir is angry about that. It shouldn't have taken Tuilindien carrying a child that is Fëanáro's grandson, and he lets his father know his opinion about that in very clear and very loud words.

But as the weeks march on and Tuilindien advises him to just be grateful, like she is, that Fëanáro no longer aims barbed words and looks at her during every conversation, Carnistir settles into grudging… not quite forgiveness, but acceptance at least. He attempts to be civil with his father.

And his father does give him good advice, surprisingly much of which is how to best take care of Tuilindien during the year that she bears their child.

That advice, more openly caring and tender than anything his father has said to him since he was a child, makes Carnistir look at his father with new respect. It also makes him understand, after years of wondering, why his wise mother agreed to have children with Fëanáro six times.

He doesn't know whether to expect joy or disappointment from Fëanáro when he tells him of Tuilindien discovering that their child is most likely a daughter.

There is only joy. The more cynical side of Carnistir thinks it is because Curufinwë is having a son so a granddaughter is a novelty that a second grandson would not have been. More charitably, he thinks it might be because Fëanáro genuinely has hoped for a daughter to join their family.

'A grandson and a granddaughter to be born in the same year', he says with a rare blissful smile. 'You and Curufinwë are making me and Nerdanel very happy and proud parents and grandparents indeed.'

'Tuilindien and Netyarë are doing the harder part of the work', Carnistir points out, and instead of being irritated by the rebuttal, Fëanáro laughs and agrees.

*

As Tuilindien's year of pregnancy draws near its end, Carnistir dislikes being away from her more and more.

Tuilindien no longer objects to his fussing – and at this point, even Carnistir himself admits that it is fussing.

And for her part, Tuilindien at last readily admits when she is exhausted, either in body and spirit or both. Carnistir does all he can to ease the long last weeks and days of her pregnancy: he takes care of as many physical things as he can, and spends hours in silent communication with their daughter's fëa. It is by now very lively, as is her hröa, granting Tuilindien little rest.

It does feel like she resembles him quite a lot, Carnistir has to admit.

He is still worried about Tuilindien. In many of the moments when she rests he listens to her breathe, sometimes with a hand on her heart to feel it beat.

It brings him consolation that she is never in ill spirits, only tired, and his mother's supportive yet no-nonsense attitude to his worrying helps too. Nerdanel comes over on most days until Tuilindien's mother arrives to stay with them for the last week and some weeks after the baby is born.

'Your father was the same with me, every time', Nerdanel confides in Carnistir on a day when he feels he should do even more for Tuilindien but doesn't know what. 'For the first few babies his excuse was that we couldn't know whether his children would be as dangerous to bear as he was. Then for the last few it was that we had already had so many, more than most, that he worried my strength could not last through it all.'

'But it did.' Carnistir manages to find a smile for his mother.

She smiles, too. 'Yes, I recovered well every time. Women are stronger than men think we are, most of the time.'

And his father tells him, 'You are doing well and so is Tuilindien.'

Carnistir raises his brows. 'Rare praise from you.'

Fëanáro busies himself with gathering up the papers Carnistir came to get from him so he can do a little bit of design work from home.

Fëanáro says, 'I may disagree with your wife's choices in how she occupies her time and what customs of our people she has refused to adopt, but I find no fault in how she conducts herself in matters of family.'

Carnistir chooses to say nothing of how Fëanáro disapproves of Tuilindien being a Vanya, still, but raises his brows at his last remark. 'What does that even mean?'

Stiffly, Fëanáro lists, 'How devoted she is to you, how she treats Pityo and Telvo just as if they were her own little brothers – teaching and guiding and always welcoming them in your house, though we all know they still tend to leave a mess behind wherever they go – and how… how she is with your daughter.'

The last compliment could be much more detailed, but Carnistir will take it. But he cannot help saying, 'It is remarkable how difficult it is for your silver tongue to say nice things about her.'

His step is light, however, as he returns home to his beloved and their child that he cannot wait to meet.

*

Tuilindien cries when she is very happy. That is something that Carnistir knows well: she cried the night they became engaged, when they married, and when she realised she was pregnant.

Yet when their daughter is born, she only cries a few tears of exhausted pain during her labour, and none when the baby is in her arms. She has only smiles then, and silly tired grins, and Carnistir cries and cries until the tuft of jet-black hair on the baby's head becomes blurry in his eyes.

He blinks and wipes away the tears because he doesn't want to lose a moment of this. The baby is snuffling sleepily against Tuilindien's breast as Tuilindien gazes down at her with all the love in the world in her eyes while a tiny, perfect finger is curled around Carnistir's, and the room is filled with the quietness of the three people of his family resting on the bed instead of two.

Tuilindien breaks the silence. 'You should hold her now', she says. 'I'm so tired I fear I will drop her on the bed.'

'You wouldn't', he says, but takes her when she carefully passes the baby to him. He is glad, and so is Tuilindien, that they got to practice with little Tyelperinquar for a few weeks.

Tuilindien's eyes are half-lidded but bright as she lies down and looks at him and at their daughter in his arms. 'I have never been so tired', she says. 'Or so happy.'

He sends her as much love and comfort and strength as he can. He feels drained of energy himself. 'I could not wait for her to be here', he says as he stares at their child, learning every single little thing about her and pressing them all deep in his heart. 'And now it almost strange that she is.'

Tuilindien mumbles her agreement. She is slipping into well-deserved sleep.

Carnistir's daughter is such a light weight in his arms, but there was nothing fragile about the ear-piercing crying she began as soon as she entered the world. Carnistir feels almost like his fingers stroking her cheek recognise her physical form just as his spirit recognised hers when he first held her: as akin to him and to Tuilindien, but her own being.

'Welcome to the world, beloved child', he whispers to her once more.

His daughter blinks at him sleepily, halfway to Lórien's realm. Carnistir hopes that a newborn's dreams there are as soft and comforting as the blanket he has draped her in.

He leans back against the back of his chair and listens to his child and wife breathe, deep and even.

*

A/N: I headcanon that elf parents-to-be don't work much during their year of expecting a child. They spend a lot of time communicating with their child and supporting their growth, as an elven pregnancy is more spiritually draining to both parents. So their family and community support them, if needed, during this important and relatively rare time in the couple's long life.

I would love to hear what you thought of the chapter <3

In the next chapter: more fluff, and talk about names.

[elesianne]

A very hastily done moodboard for This life that we’ve created in celebration of finishing the last chapter.

[elesianne]

A Silmarillion fanfic, chapter three of four – Carnistir/Tuilindien

Chapter length: ~2,700 words; Story rating: Teenage audiences

A/N: I had to split the 'last' chapter into two because it became too long, so there will be another chapter after this one. I'll try to post it some time next week. This chapter is just one happy, quiet family moment.

Warnings: Very quick references to pregnancy and childbirth.

AO3 LINK

*

Chapter III //  Daughter of Míriel’s line

The next two days are peaceful and quiet. Tuilindien rests and nurses the baby, and Carnistir takes care of them both. They do not hurry with holding a ceremony to announce the child's father-name, or to have even close family visit; they prefer to have a few days this private time to bond, and anyway, Tuilindien needs the rest. The labour was long, and it will take time for her to recover.

Carnistir knows it is only normal. Everyone told him so, beforehand, knowing that he needed the reassurance. He is not taking any chances, though. He will gladly keep other people away as long as she Tuilindien lets him.

When she wakes up from rest again on the evening of the third day since the baby was born, Carnistir once again brings her food and helps her sit up to eat. She has barely finished the nourishing soup when their daughter wakes up and starts fussing in her cot that Carnistir brought next to the bed and attached there already before the baby was born.

Carnistir lifts her, marvelling again that the child is here and that he can touch her, and most of all that his touch seems to calm her – only for a moment, though, before she remembers that she is hungry.

It takes a little while for mother and daughter to negotiate the beginning of nursing again, but once the baby gets started she suckles with good appetite.

It feels a little strange to watch, as a spectator to mother and daughter's shared experience, but Carnistir does watch because Tuilindien said the first time that it was alright.

As soon as she is certain that the baby has latched on well and is comfortable, Tuilindien lifts her eyes to him and smiles, tired and triumphant still.

He smiles back.

'Do you want something more to eat once she is finished with her meal?' he asks. It is surprisingly easy to set his own, lesser tiredness aside and focus on taking care of Tuilindien, like it was all through her pregnancy.

You always have been overprotective of me, she said when he once expressed his surprise. It serves you well now that you guard me against my own exhaustion.

'No, thank you', Tuilindien says. 'Just some more water, please.'

He pours her a glass and sets it on the bedside table.

'Look at her', Tuilindien whispers, her eyes on the baby again. She sounds almost choked up suddenly. 'Look at her, my love. How beautiful she is, how full of life.'

His own voice rough, he agrees, 'Yes.' And because that might be inadequate an answer, he adds, 'I could look at the two of you all day.'

Their daughter, their sweet spring child, has Tuilindien's golden-brown skin but a thick tuft of black hair – Carnistir's hair, though curlier, a little like Tuilindien's in that at least. Carnistir cannot find it in himself to be disappointed though he had dearly hoped for a golden-haired child; the baby is beautiful for all that she looks a lot like him.

He leans forward in his chair to touch her tightly clenched fist and marvels for the hundredth time at how small her fingers are compared to his. Her grip is strong, though, for such a small person. Stronger than Curufinwë's son's, Carnistir thinks smugly, though he is certainly a biased judge.

He marvels at Tuilindien, too, at her strength that to his shame he has doubted. And he looks at how tenderly she holds their daughter, and that makes his chest as warm and tight as the baby's chubby cheeks and already-familiar spirit do.

He takes the baby to burp her when she is done feeding. He practised this, too, with Curufinwë's son during the last few weeks. He is glad that he did. Before Tyelperinquar, the last babies he burped were Ambarussar, so he was out of practise.

As he walks to the window while his daughter grows sleepy in his hold, Tuilindien asks, 'Is it raining still?'

'It is.' It has been raining since before Tuilindien's labour started, and the few flowers that had bloomed already are beaten to the ground almost. The gardeners will have plenty of work once the rain stops.

'How strange that the rain has lasted longer than our child's life', Tuilindien muses. She is arranging herself to a more comfortable position. 'Come to bed', she says to him firmly. 'You need to rest, too.'

'I have rested.'

'In that chair.'

'That chair –' he begins, but Tuilindien interrupts him.

'That chair is not a bed. Don't make me have to fuss about you', she chastises him.

And of course he yields, in something like this. 'Fine, I will come to bed.'

'We must all rest when we can', Tuilindien whispers as she watches, with a small smile, him cuddle their baby close. The baby's perfect little eyelashes are fluttering as she draws close to sleep, her fëa withdrawing from Carnistir's reach.

He'd expected to feel her spirit more distinctly after she was born than when she was in Tuilindien's womb, but he barely does. It apparently is normal, though, and Carnistir knows also that as weeks and then a few years pass and their child gains, little by little, control of herself, he and Tuilindien will no longer feel her in an open connection until – if – she chooses to let them in again.

His heart aches as he thinks of not being connected to his child like he has been, but he knows that it is a good and natural thing that must happen. It means that the child no longer needs so much support from their parents as they do during the first few years of their life.

He is not yet looking forward to it, though, and he takes solace in feeling the sleepily contented mood of his daughter as she lays in his arms.

'We need to decide on a name for her soon', he says, quietly so as not to disturb either the baby or Tuilindien's slipping into restfulness. 'It feels strange thinking of her as just 'the baby' or 'daughter'.'

Tuilindien smiles. She says, 'Come to bed and let us discuss it.'

Carnistir gives the baby to her for a moment, saying, 'I'll hold her again as soon as I get in.'

He stands up, realising as he does how badly he does need rest. He circles the bed and gets in on the other side, praising his past self for commissioning a large bed where he can keep a distance from Tuilindien so he can't hurt her by a sudden accidental touch. She is very sore.

But as he lies down at a good distance from her she asks, 'Hold me too, darling, please', and he bites his lip to keep from asking if she's sure. She has reminded him many times that she knows the limits of her body and mind better than he does.

Still, as he scoots closer to her, slow and careful, he tells her, 'Tell me how I can hold you both.'

Her lips tug into a smile. 'It is surely the first time that you need instructions on how to hold me', she says, but she does tell him in clear and gentle words.

He settles in his place, leaning against the headboard with one arm around Tuilindien and the other cradling the baby. Tuilindien tugs the baby's little tunic straight so it's comfortable, and pats her stomach gently until she closes her eyes and keeps them closed. She slips into sleep as quietly as she is loud in waking up.

Carnistir doesn't realise that he has frozen in place, just looking at the baby and the way her chest rises and falls in so rapid a rhythm it is still a little startling, until Tuilindien calls his name.

He raises his head so rapidly that his hair that escaped its braid a day ago and he has forgotten to retie hits him the face, and he spits strands of hair out of his mouth and decides at once to cut it shorter as soon as he can.

Tuilindien says in a soft sigh against his shoulder, 'My love, all is well, you need not worry. Try to rest; you promised me.'

It was hardly worded like a promise, he thinks, but he intends to honour it all the same.

'As for the name –' She yawns; he presses a kiss on her head, on her messy, dirty hair. 'It is yours to decide. Her father-name.'

'And yours to approve.' She is better with words.

'You do not need my approval. But we can talk about it, of course.' And as she speaks she touches his hand, sharing with the aid of touch with him a flicker-fast image of her trust in him.

She hasn't needed to touch him to share thoughts with him since early on in their courting, and it makes worry rise in his heart again. Is she that tired in spirit? But he swallows his words of concern and instead holds her just a little bit tighter and thinks at her, Thank you, my beloved, for understanding me.

He has a name in his mind already. He has known it since he first laid eyes on his child. He hopes that Tuilindien will like it, too.

Tuilindien caresses their sleeping child's little head with careful fingers, no doubt as fascinated by the down-softness of her hair as Carnistir still is. 'Have you a name for her?'

Carnistir is finally ready to share the name that came to his mind as soon as he saw their daughter come into the world, screaming and red-faced and her black hair flat on her head. It now sticks up in tiny curls most of the time.

'I do know that daughters, eldest daughters especially, are often given a father-name reminiscent of their mother's name or qualities', he begins.

Tuilindien looks at him like she already knows what he is going to say. 'Not always', she says. 'I would not mind if you named her after yourself.'

He sighs, exaggerating the sound for her sake. 'You know me too well.'

'It was your hesitation to talk to me of her name that made me think you want to name her after yourself.' She caresses his hand instead of the baby for a moment. 'You should not have  hesitated.'

'We might not have other daughters', he says, arguing even against himself as he is wont to do.

'Or we might have three more, like my parents. Either way, I will not mind.'

'Then I shall call her Moriel', he says. Daughter of the black one, or dark daughter, or daughter of the night, or all of them. 'It is the simplest name, the most obvious one, I know, but I trust that you will give her a better name in time.'

'It is a good name.' There is a soft, sleepy smile in Tuilindien's voice. All her smiles are soft and sleepy now. 'She was born at night, and her hair is as black as yours.'

Carnistir takes his turn caressing their daughter's dark hair ever so gently. 'When I was a child I hated my pitch-black hair and that my father named me for it, my least beautiful feature. I thought then that nothing dark could be as good as light, based on all stories and songs I'd heard.

'Seeing the same black hair on her little head, and curling up like yours – it is beautiful. I understand now my father, and the name he gave me, like I never did before.'

'And that is also why you want to name her for her black hair.' Tuilindien rests her head on his shoulder and takes a strand of her own hair, warm-golden and curly, and one of his, black and straight, and twines them around each other.

Carnistir closes his eyes for a moment – it is all almost too much happiness – and then opens them because he is holding the baby. He is holding Moriel.

'Did you choose it also because of Míriel?' Tuilindien asks.

'I did not think of it because of her', he has to reply. 'It came to my mind because of more self-centred reasons. But I am glad that it resembles her name.'

'Your father will like it.'

'He will.' The smile that took up near-permanent residence of Carnistir's face when Moriel was born becomes crooked. 'He doesn't deserve it, though – the joy he will get from that name. Not after how he has treated you.'

'And you for loving me', Tuilindien says quietly. 'But he has been much more pleasant recently.'

Carnistir snorts at that, and gives Moriel his index finger to clutch in her sleep. It calms him down and, together with the warm contented restfulness he can still feel in the thread of connection between him and his child, brings back his smile.

'I did not choose her name because it is like Míriel's', he repeats. 'But it is fitting, Moriel for the first daughter born of Míriel's line.' He chuckles. 'I wonder, if I had been born a girl with hair this black, would my father have called me Moriel?'

'Perhaps you should ask him.' Tuilindien smiles too.

'Perhaps I will.' Right now Carnistir is more interested in thinking about how Moriel's cheeks are slightly ruddy in shade, more so than Tuilindien's. He wonders if she will get freckles when she is older, like he has.

'You should send word to your parents and brothers that they can come see Moriel tomorrow', Tuilindien suggests. 'We can tell them the name, too, though the official naming ceremony will have to wait a few weeks. I know that your family will want to do it with great pomp and circumstance.'

'Are you sure you are ready for my parents and all my brothers? There are so very many of them.'

He would have her rest for a day more, at least – though his family is very eager and impatient to meet the newest addition to the family. He has been fending them off, and their messages and their gifts, for two days out of the three that Moriel has lived. The only person Tuilindien has wanted to see is her own mother which Carnistir knows is very understandable, though it rankled him a bit at first.

'We could let only my parents come', he suggests. 'Not the pack of brothers.'

'Netyarë and Curufin let us meet Tyelperinquar when he was only two days old', Tuilindien reminds him. 'We might as well let them all meet Moriel tomorrow. I know you worry about me still but you do not need to. I feel strong enough to sit up in bed and beam like the proud mother I am as you pass Moriel around to each member of your family like the little treasure she is.'

'Not a little treasure', Carnistir says. Moriel still holds on to his finger with her tiny one. 'The greatest one.' He realises he did not give Tuilindien a proper reply. He says, 'If you are certain you are up to it.'

'I am.' Tuilindien combs her fingers through her half-unravelled braid. 'If you are up to looking after Moriel alone while my mother helps me wash as much as I can and get dressed – it is another strange thing about having a child, having to rely on my own mother for things she hasn't helped me with since I was a child – and tidying the room to be fit for visitors.'

'Of course I can do those things.'

'Good.' Tuilindien sighs. 'Let us do them in the morning, and have your family visit later in the day.'

'I will send an invitation.'

'Not a formal one that makes it sound like a grand occasion.' Tuilindien yawns. 'It will be a short visit.'

'When have I done anything formally?' he grins, feeling light as air despite the tiredness weighing down his limbs.

He does not need to go anywhere quite yet. He can stay here, cradling little Moriel in his arms, Tuilindien beside him slipping into a healing sleep again, birds singing their spring courting songs outside the window even as the rain continues falling down on newly-green earth.

He will send the message later, after he has rested a little.

*

A/N: Thank you for reading! I would love to hear what you thought of this chapter, whether in an AO3 comment, Tumblr reply, or tags – I love them all <3