Hold

Mellow Soulmate AU.  Finwë makes his choice and leaves behind the woman who left him in the dust.  This is something of a prequel to "Exception" and "Reunion" and a sequel to "Dim".  Basically, I have begun to explore the relationships of the High King and his two wives, who I believe he loved.  I hate stories where Indis is just the second choice so that she can pop out more babies.  I just don't like.  Takes place (probably) in the Mansions of Manwë atop Mount Taniquetil in the Years of the Trees.

Disclaimer: I don't own the Silmarillion

Pairings: past Finwë x Míriel, Finwë x Indis

Characters: Finwë, Manwë, Indis (mentions the Valar in general, Fëanor, Míriel and Indis' four as of yet unborn children)

Warning: canon compliant AU, soulmate stuff, something vaguely resembling eternal damnation, a bit of vengeful spirit, mentions some kissing, ideology touched

Song: Inner Universe

Words: 1,607
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
hold (verb): to have possession or ownership of or have at one's disposal; to have as a privilege or position of responsibility; to keep under restraint
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hold?show=0&t=1377639890

"You must make a decision."

It had been years.  Many years since his wife had gone into rest and abandoned the cage of her mortal body.  Long years of gray and grieving.  Long years of loneliness.  Long years of struggling to get through each day.

Long years of rediscovery.  Long years of learning how to laugh all over again.  Long years spent bringing the color back into his world.

And now this.

"Only one spouse can be had for eternity.  Two is... unthinkable..."

She had been lovely in a way Finwë found refreshingly strange and wonderful.  Indis was not the silver fire that had been Míriel, a brand to the touch, hotter than the earth's blood.  Instead she was gentle and golden, like the touch of Laurelin on a lazy summer day, the warmth of her very presence seeping beneath his skin and heating the frigid core long left in silence and brokenness.

It was Indis, shy and young with her huge blue eyes and tiny, blush-worthy smile, who had brought back the color and vibrancy he had so lacked and missed.  For which he had wistfully yearned and desired.  It was she who had driven him from the cold, treaded corridors of his empty home and nudged him back into the stream of politics and society.  It was she who had allowed him to learn to smile and laugh a second time.  And she who taught him again how to feel oneness and intimacy with another at his side.

She had turned into his entire world.

He knew many said he only wanted her for breeding.  He knew they thought she was nothing more than a replacement.  But it was more.  So much, much more.

They fit together.  Two long-lost halves of a greater whole.  He could feel it. 

And he was holding on to her with both hands, in spite of what anyone else slandered or rumored.  When had he ever concerned himself over the approval of his advisors, councilors and courtiers?  He was the High King, and if he wished to marry again, he could do as he pleased.

Was it such a crime to want to be loved?  To want to have closeness and security in the arms of a woman he adored?

To be enchanted a second time?

"A decision will have to be made, for things cannot remain as they are now..."

And yet...

Indis filled in a part of his being that had always been empty.  She did not replace Míriel, whose empty space in his chest and whose jagged and severed bond in his soul still remained cold as ice and devoid of feeling.  Numb.

Loving Indis did not make him love Míriel less.

Did not take away the tiny threads of hope laced cancerously through his heart--the hope that kept him sane in those long years of being alone and raising his infant son to adulthood with no spouse to lean against and share the burden--that one day she might come back.  That, after a long rest in the quiet of the Halls of the Waiting she might return to him recovered and loving, might burn once more as a beacon in the darkness with her own spirit forged in flame and tempered with steel.

And he could not help but hold onto that hope, even now, tightly between his fingers.  Even as he cradled Indis in his arms in the dark and kissed her on the balcony in the privacy of Telperion's silvered fingertips, he could not forget his first lady wife, his shining Míriel.  Could not give up and throw away slivers of memories and wishes and dreams.

"We will grant you this boon.  You may marry Lady Indis with our blessing, but only if Lady Míriel remains--until the day you yourself pass into the keeping of Lord Námo--under our care and never again takes physical form."

Never again lives.  Never again draws the same air into her lungs as you and your usurping spouse.  This they did not say, but Finwë did not need to be told what it was that they meant.

They meant to keep him apart.  If not from one, then from the other.  To keep their personal ideal of balance and fairness.  To make their world perfect in symmetry and order.

The resent bubbled fitfully.

Because he could not hold on to both.

"A decision must be made.  Choose, Noldóran."

But how could he?

How could he release that fleeting little dream that cradled itself deep in the ocean of his mind, rocking slowly in the distance, half-obscured from his sight but so intrinsically present.  Someday his Míriel might choose to come home.  Might want to kiss him again and hold his hand once more.  Might want to meet her son who had her lips and her fire and her creativity.  Her genius.

Did he have the right to take that choice away from her?  To lock her away in the Halls of the Waiting in selfishness?  To throw away all that they had created in togetherness?

Could he allow himself to let go of her?  Of his hope?  Of that single candle-flame that led him through the twisted, thorny maze that had become his life after her death?

Could he choose to leave her behind?

But then he would close his eyes and see Indis.

Would feel the warmth of her in his arms and the softness of her sweet, naïve little kisses on his cheeks.  Would hear her melodic voice reciting poetry in the back of his mind, speaking of love and the sky and the stars.  Would be speared with her coy little smile and knocked off his feet by the flutter of her flaxen eyelashes.

Would look into their future and see children and grandchildren.  Sons and daughters and their sons and daughters, maybe with golden hair, maybe with blue eyes.  Would see them together standing in the nursery, his arms wrapped about her slender frame, a newborn within the embrace of her arms, tiny and chubby with impossibly perfect, delicate fingers and huge, instinctively curious milky eyes.  Would see himself tracing a finger over those cheeks and feel tears blur at the edges of his vision when he recalled the sheer love and amazement of seeing one's child for the first time...

What to hold on to... and what to release...

"Must I choose?"

Had he the heart and courage, he would have looked his King and Lord in the eyes, but Finwë did not dare, instead staring into the distance.  Watching his visions play out in silence.  Outlining his fate.

Silver and gold.  So different.  Both completing him.  Both enrapturing him.

He loved them both so, so very much.

But...

"The law is plain.  I have done all I can do and shown all the compassion I might."

Whether or not that was true, Finwë knew better than to press.  Knew that he could not convince the Valar change their minds.  Knew that he could not make them understand.

He had to make a choice.

Who to hold... and who to let go...

But in the end, he knew.  Knew.

Remembered well the bitter aloneness in the wake of Míriel's sleep.  Remembered the loss of the companionship and love he so treasured.  Remembered telling her how much he loved her and needed her in the days of her waning.

Remembered her turning away without any reply.

Remembered that that silver vision offered him only death and despair.  That any hope that tiny thread held was long passed.  Any future it brought had been lost in the vaults of ever-flowing time.

And knew that the golden light offered life.

"I know that I was not supposed to fall in love a second time or marry a second time.  I know that it is against the rules, knew it from the beginning and did so despite..."

Knew that there would be many more nights of embraces and passion behind closed doors.  Many more kisses shared in affection and laughs exchanged in camaraderie.  Many more long days of hard work with companionship waiting at the end to comfort instead of black and white silence.

Maybe it was selfish.

But was not Míriel selfish in her rest?

The High King looked to the Lord of Arda and met the endless sky-eyes without hesitation, standing straight in determination, an unmovable pillar of resolve. "I cannot release my hold upon Indis.  And I will do whatever must be done to keep her at my side.  I love her."

He could feel eyes boring into him, judging and weighing.  Finwë did not flinch away as he would have liked beneath that scrutiny.  Did not allow himself diffidence or second guessing.

Brought forth a vision of his wife golden-haired and glowing with pride and joy, a baby in her arms.  Light made brighter by the newest addition to their small, broken family.  And felt that light seeping back into his spirit where it had been left drained and dim by disappointment and heartbreak.

"Very well."

The thread snapped.  And it hurt at the edges of the frayed stump.

But it was a sacrifice.  And, for all its terrible finality, Finwë felt a weight slide off his shoulders.  Felt himself let go.  Found a smile blooming upon his lips as he looked ahead instead of behind.  Letting go of the memory of that past.

So that he might hold on to that precious future.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I absolutely love the song I have chosen for today.  Inner Universe is one of Yoko Kanno's songs (Sora is another that I love) and it's Russian (in case it doesn't sound familiar enough to tell).  Someone totally spammed the comments saying the lyrics have no meaning (they were actually Russian and know the language but didn't appear to appreciate the metaphorical and interpretational value of the poetry) but I think they're full of crap.  This song is beautiful and totally applies.  Plus, it's just an awesome mixture of styles and language that makes me squeal.

It did not influence the story itself much.  I've known I was going to write this story for this prompt for a good while now and have been waiting.  It turned out better than I suspected, and I really actually like it.  I like the depth that Finwë and Indis are starting to accumulate.  In so many stories they're nothing more than faces and empty words with no character and no development.  It makes me so sad, because I've begun to become so very fond of them both.  Yes, even Indis of the Vanyar.  Hard to believe, eh?

I'm ending this here, though, because I really want to publish this before midnight.  Didn't have much else to say anyway LOL.  Hope you enjoyed the mushiness.