Whitewash

Canon compliant AU.  (Rhythm AU?).  Scandal is averted for the time being.  But every deal comes at a price.  Quenya names used (Fëanor = Fëanáro).  Basically, this is a continuation of "Test" from a while back.  It is thus related also to "Rhythm" (the other uber-feminist piece) and "Sword" (obscurely).  This is an arc that's been on hold for ages.  We'll see if it goes anywhere, I guess.  Takes place in Tirion during the Years of the Trees.

Disclaimer: I don't own the Silmarillion or any other Tolkien works

Pairings: past Lalwen x OMC

Characters: Lalwen, Aranwë, Finwë (mentions Indis, Findis, Fëanor, Fingolfin, Finarfin, the Valar and Eru)

Warning: canon-compliant AU, premarital sex, scandal (averted), politics of royal families, sexism, feminism, secret identities

Song: Sound of Falling Rain

Words: 1,055
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
whitewash (verb): to whiten with whitewash; to gloss over or cover up (as vices or crimes); to exonerate by means of a perfunctory investigation or through biased presentation of data
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/whitewash

It was a ridiculous farce.  Insulting and demeaning and disgusting.

She had been prepared to face the reality of her situation head on, a brave warrior in the face of an army marching upon the horizon.  Prepared for scolding.  Prepared for ridicule.  Prepared for ostracism and the rumors and the sideways glances.  Ten steps over the point of no return, and she had been willing to go another twenty if only to reach the tantalizing freedom lying upon the other side.

Only to have that freedom snatched away.

Lalwen wondered if Eru himself despised her and her radical ways to hold upon a string before her eyes that which she desired and so cruelly then snatch it away as she reached out to grasp it and risked her feet leaving the stability of the earth in the process.  Did he frown upon her wild and masculine spirit trapped in the body of a disobedient, unruly female?  Every rule of society she broke.  Every regulation of behavior she stretched.  Every dictation of the Valar she pushed to the very limits, refusing to back down into a demure young maiden, spineless and helpless.

It was not who she was.  It was not who she wished to be.

But it was who she was expected to be.

So desperate were they to keep her from her freedom--from her most visceral, intrinsic self--that she had become little more than a layer of whitewash over her scandalous dealings in the haystacks of her lover's barn.  A fresh layer of pale snow to hide away the damning evidence beneath.

A lie.

"It is so very generous of you, my lady, to take in a babe of not even a year.  Why, his parents must be so grateful!  To think, in the face of such tragedy, at least they can rest in the Halls without worry."

Her son's parents.  Supposedly dead in a fire caught in the hay that had spread.  Only their child made it out alive, and at the sacrifice of his mother's life.  Or so the story went, that she lay in the grass with the virtuous princess at her side and expelled her last breath with Lalwen's promise to care for the boy resonating within her heart.  That she passed to the halls relieved and reassured.

And thus ruination turned into something "beautiful".

"It is for the best, yenya.  For you and for your child."

"But atto--"

"In this you will obey me, Írien."

Her child, the baby who had suckled at her bosom in his first few moments of life.  Who she had carried within her womb for a full rotation of the seasons.  Who she had given birth to without the help of a healer in her bed at the country estate.

Her son.

And her parents had spread the whispers and the rumors before they had even told her of their plans.  Had insured her reputation remain intact when she returned from Formenos with an infant pressed safely against her chest, nuzzling her for affection and crying for her attention.  Had even announced her false intentions before the entirety of court without even consulting her, for she was naught but their maiden daughter.  Powerless in this world of men and rulers.

And thus everyone, from the lowest sailor's daughter to the most powerful lords of court, believed that her son was born of another woman.  That she had adopted him, her own flesh and blood.

And she could not tell them the truth.  She could not openly defy her father again.

But this had not been what she wanted.  To raise a child in social exile would have been challenging and disheartening, but she could have relied upon her brothers and sisters and mother for guidance and assistance--even Fëanáro was hard-pressed to hold her vibrant and lively spirit in contempt!  She would have had all the support her independent, nonconformist's spirit would have desired and required to carry on through the difficult days.

Now, she had not even the choice.  Rather than raising her son in exile--as her own son--she would be raising him in the midst of court as someone else's boy.  He would grow into adulthood believing he was not truly a part of her family.  Not related to his cousins.  Not the blood-nephew of her brothers and sisters.  Not the grandson of her father and mother.

Just some farmer's son she took pity upon.  Just a nobody.  That was all he would be to them.  To everyone but she and those few who knew the truth.

Even her son, she would not be able to tell that gorgeous, breathtaking truth.  Not until he was grown.  Not until his blood had time to heat with resentment and bitterness, with the adult sharpness and wickedness enough to carpet blame upon her shoulders and turn his back upon her love in spite and pride and the ache within his chest.

She held him now, looked down upon him and wondered if she had faded into the wall.  If all she ever would be was a lie.  To everyone.  Even her own child.  If this was her fate.

To be whitewashed into purity.  Captured in that snowy cage.

She held her son now within the confines of those bars and took comfort in the soft puffs of his breaths.  In the feeling of his tiny body sharing her warmth, instinctively recognizing her in the moment in which nothing mattered but being near her.  

In the knowledge that he would never want for anything, never doubt her love, even if he never knew the truth, because Lalwen refused to give in.  Refused to fade completely.  And if ever she was blanched with hidden scandal, she would not allow her child to come to the same fate.

She would fight back.  For herself.  For him.

For he was her son.  Her Aranwë.  Her son of kings.

That much, at least, would ever reflect the truth in this warped reality.  And it would have to be enough.

To quell the fury of her spirit.  And the disappointment that ate away at her heart.