Genres: Friendship, General

Rating: G

List of terms used:
The Bright/Bright People/One(s): Minyar, Vanyar;
The Dark/Dark People/One(s): Tatyar, Ñoldor;
The Fair/Fair People/One(s): Nelyar, Teleri.

Notes: A gapfiller to my one-shot (not yet posted) Stay With Me. Seeing how the Unbegotten are yet quite young in mind in this stage of their life, the tone of this piece is rather childish. I also use the version of the telling that says Elwë (Elu Thingol) has two brothers: Olwë and Elmo. And here Nowë (Círdan) is the chieftain of their people, not Elwë. (Yes, I am mangling some legends stated in canon here, and also several fanon interpretations.)

Summary: How was swimming invented?

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“What’re you doing, Nowë?” Elmo hopped to the Chiftain’s side. It was several star-turnings after the Awakening and their gathering by the lakeshore, but still they found new things and concepts. And Nowë produced some creepy – unlooked-for, unthought-for – contributions.

In answer, Nowë pointed at the span of gently-moving liquid before them, grinning.

“Bad, bad thing. It nearly swallowed Elwë,” Elmo grumbled, frowning darkly in recollection. But then he conceded, “I think it just doesn’t like people plunking into it and stirring its deep ends. Though it’s actually Finwë’s fault.” He glared at a short finger of liquid lapping at the small rocky prominence on which they crouched. That Dark One had nearly made his eldest brother swallowed by the water, and he was unpleasantly reminded of the Black Hunter taking some stray Quendi from their midst. They had been playing too near to the shore, or so Elwë had reluctantly confessed, and Finwë had accidentally jostled Elwë when they were racing to the Brights’ camp.

“Oh no,” Nowë insisted. “It told me how to stay on the surface. Elwë just didn’t know. I can teach you, and you can teach people, so nobody will be swallowed again.” He flapped his hands by his ears for emphasis, then did it in the water – spraying them with droplets in the process.

Elmo stared at Nowë for a long moment. The Fair People loved Nowë dearly, but they agreed that their chieftain’s excessive interest in water was rather weird. Nowë spent most of his time contemplating it on the spot he was now occupying, and doing some daring or just outright quirky experiments with it. He could not deny that the knowledge and skills Nowë discovered helped the Quendy very much, but that did not make Nowë less unnerving most of the times.