AB

20, DE, they/them, compsci. this blog is an abomination of complaining about star wars and complaining about my courses, with the occasional poorly done artwork in between. how many years is it going to take me to finish my four-year degree? vote now on your iphones. (hint! it's more than 4!)

[psychotic-gerard]

boobs you can deattach and reattach. we all want that. how though.

i have a normal relation with the chest of the human body.

velcro.

sticky tape

pushpin.

bluetack

zipper

buttons

stitching / unstitching

clasp on/off

install / uninstall button

other option

show results

Voting ended onOct 16, 2023

[dambiex]

oh no...

[imaveryevilgirl]

welcome to the dysphoria site would you like some ds cartridge style removable titties

[siblingshowdown]

Sibling Showdown Round 2 Bracket D1

Maedhros, Maglor, Celegorm, Caranthir, Curufin, Amrod, and Amras (The Silmarillion) vs. Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie (The Chronicles of Narnia)

Sons of Fëanor

Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy

Voting ended onMay 13, 2023

Image credit: The Oath of Fëanor by Jenny Dolfen (goldseven.de) used with permission, also showing Fëanor

[thetalee]

[shrikeseams]

As someone who's always uuuuuuuh skeptical that all the dead and/or sailed elves are actually content to be limited to Aman forever, I'm always chewing at the idea that various elves are angry and resentful and rebellious about the whole thing.

And you know who maybe ought to be their poster child? Celebrian. Celebrian, who didn't freely choose Aman by any stretch of the imagination. Celebrian, who clearly still took joy and found fulfilling work in Middle Earth before her captivity. Celebrian, who had to sacrifice all of that joy and loves labor and the company of her family for a chance at healing--and was then left without that joy and the family she knew once she did finally heal.

Imagine Celebrian greeting Elrond on the docks, bittersweet not because Arwen chose mortality, but because Elrond walked into the trap for her sake. Celebrian who is deeply, bitterly envious of her children, who could choose their own paths and come (or not) to Aman in their own time.

Celebrian, every inch her mother's daughter, frantically searching for way to pick the lock of the cage that Galadriel broke free of, and then walked back into freely as well.

Celebrian, who has connections through blood and politics to, what, nearly every cultural group of elves in western Muddle Earth and Aman? If anyone could easily weave an alliance of the disillusioned sailed and the malcontent reimbodied, it's her.

[freeformekun]

[viperosedae]

If your friend had a part of their body amputated and chose to cook it into food, would you eat it?

yes

no

no, and also what the fuck

i have daydreamed about this for years on end

other (tags?)

Voting ended onApr 14, 2023

obligatory "reblog for sample size please" aaand Post.

[fabulous-feanorians]

Yk what cracks me up is that the Council of Elrond isn’t even an organized event planned years in advance or anything. It’s just like…the messengers of a bunch of world leaders with a bunch of different problems coming to Elrond for advice but coincidentally they all get there at the same time,,,,

It’s hilarious. Elrond sitting them down like schoolchildren at a history lesson to explain how all their problems are connected. The random forming of the fellowship bc it’s a bunch of strangers prepared to go take a message back home but instead they get sent on a quest to save the world,,,,

Just the chaos of it all. The way literally everyone’s initial response to their problems was “let’s go ask Elrond.”

“Let’s go as Elrond” is the middle earth equivalent of “google it” and I think that’s great.

[modernincorrectlotrhobbit]

Boromir: Aragorn, I have a weird question for you.

Aragorn: What's up?

Boromir: You describe yourself as bisexual, right?

Aragorn: Uh, yes, I do.

Boromir: And you also like frogs.

Aragorn: Yeah, I fucking love frogs.

Boromir:

Boromir: Are those two things related?

[growingingreenwood]

Aragorn definitely got a tattoo in Greenwood, and was just like 'it's fine, I'll just hide it from my dad.' Like every dumb teenager thinks.

And he actually does pretty well for a while there, managing to go several years without Elrond seeing the tattoo on his upper left side.

Then one day Aragorn gets dragged back to Elrond half dead, and while he's tending to his son with extreme care and concern, he's been going on a tirade the entire time like: "I literally told him not to do that. And he did exactly that. Why is your brother so stupid? Did you drop him down the stairs? Once I've finally nursed him back to health I'm going to KILL HIM for doing this."

And then he sees it.

A tattoo.

Not just any tattoo, THE tattoo.

The tattoo on his sons body.

The tattoo Elrond can tell CLEARLY is not a new addition to Aragorns body.

He just stares at it for a few seconds like: 😱🤯😤😠😡🤬💢

Basically going through all the stages of grief on 3.2 seconds (but mostly anger).

And then he just continues washing and tending to him, this time faster and more angry but not less gentle: "I'm going to look after him, kill him, care for him again, AND THEN IM GOING TO KILL HIM A SECOND T I M E."

[sallysocker]

[thelordofgifs]

the fairest stars

What if Angrist was a little tougher, and Beren and Lúthien managed to steal two Silmarils from Morgoth instead of one? Somehow I’ve already written NINE parts of this unhinged bullet point AU here and decided it was time for a fresh post to avoid that one getting too long.

Where we left off: Lúthien has been negotiating with Mandos like a pro, Maglor is nearly-but-not-quite-dead in Menegroth, Thingol has taken one Silmaril from him, Fingon has the other Silmaril and ditched Curufin outside the Girdle even though they did some bonding on the Worst Road Trip, and people are still upset about Celegorm’s death. YES I am well aware that the pipeline from the fairly normal first sentence of the post to this mess is insane.

Fingon and Maedhros are both very, very good tacticians. Between them, it isn’t very difficult for Fingon to follow Maedhros’ directions towards Menegroth, and then to find the hidden pathways by which Huan led Maedhros out of Thingol’s halls.

It helps that Thingol is still under the impression that the Girdle is impenetrable with the aid of his Silmaril, so he doesn’t have anyone keeping an eye out for the High King of the Noldor sneaking into his realm on an Adventure.

Finding Maglor's sickroom/prison cell/whatever is a little trickier, but not impossible. Long ago in Tirion Fingon was a mischievous child, so he's well aware that the best way not to get caught sneaking into a forbidden place is to make it perfectly clear that you belong there.

He strides confidently down the corridors, silently reciting Maedhros' directions to himself. Nobody stops him.

He's hoping that Curufin was wrong, and he'll know Maglor's door by the holy light showing through the cracks; but when none is evident he's forced to take his chances and start trying doors in the area Maedhros indicated at random.

Since he has plot armour is very lucky with this whole improbable-rescue thing he comes across Maglor without any trouble.

Maglor is only half-conscious – quite apart from the wounded leg, he hasn’t eaten in days – but his eyes flicker open when Fingon comes in.

“Hello, Makalaurë,” Fingon says, deliberately cheerful. “I’ve come to take you home.”

“You can’t do that,” Maglor says dazedly. “It burned – in the Bragollach – remember?”

Fingon opts not to answer that. “Russo said you were healing when he left,” he says instead, frowning at the bloodstained bandages around Maglor’s leg. “What happened? Has Thingol been mistreating you? I thought Lúthien at least was kind!”

Maybe he was too hasty in leaving Curufin outside the Girdle.

Maglor hurries to explain that Lúthien is dead, and that he’s actually in this pathetic state by choice or something.

“Right,” says Fingon, “well, you’re coming back to Himring now.”

But Maglor shakes his head. “I can’t, Finno,” he says. “Thingol took the Silmaril from me. I don’t – I’ve been trying to hold it back. The Oath. But I can’t leave it in Doriath and go, I can’t. So you’ll have to leave me behind.” He manages a brave and tragic smile.

On Thangorodrim while Fingon was struggling futilely with Morgoth’s iron shackle, hopeless tears running down his face, Maedhros said, You’ll never be able to free me, Finno, just kill me, please—

Fingon is rather sick of Fëanorian melodrama.

“One step ahead of you,” he says brightly, and he produces Maedhros’ Silmaril from its box, handing it to Maglor before his Oath can stir at the sight of it. “Here it is.”

This would never normally work. But Maglor is very tired and ill, and not thinking as clearly as he otherwise would.

As long as the obvious question doesn’t occur to him until they get outside the Girdle again—

Maglor takes the jewel and gives a relieved little sigh as the bite of the Oath eases. “You really took it from Thingol?”

“Of course,” Fingon lies. “Let’s put it back in the box for now so that it doesn’t attract too much attention?”

Maglor acquiesces. He and Fingon aren’t close exactly, but they get on well – certainly far better than Fingon does with Curufin. There’s an odd shared camaraderie that comes from loving Maedhros; it lends itself well to cooperation in difficult circumstances.

Fingon picks Maglor up – he's alarmingly light – and they begin to make their way back out of Menegroth.

"You're to be my betrothal gift," Fingon tells Maglor, and Maglor actually laughs.

Unfortunately it's much harder to look innocuous when you're carrying someone about five minutes away from expiring on the spot.

They haven't got very far before an angry voice comes from behind them: "Who are you and where are you going with the Fëanorion?"

Damn.

Meanwhile

[I should clarify my definition of "meanwhile" here. Evidently time runs much slower in Aman than it does in Middle-earth, even post-Darkening, or it's difficult to fathom why Beren and Lúthien canonically took two years to return from death. In vague support of this, the Fellowship find that time runs slowly in Lothlórien, presumably with the aid of Galadriel's ring, so I posit that the more Divine Stuff there is near a place (and Galadriel was ofc a student of Melian too), the more weird time shit occurs. So since I've anyway fudged the timelines so that travel times work out conveniently, we can also put the bits of story occurring in Aman here for funsies.]

Meanwhile, Finrod has been following Celegorm around in the Halls of Mandos.

"Was it worth it?" he asks. "Did you take joy in the lordship of Nargothrond, once I was gone?"

"I could ask you the same," says Celegorm, responding for the first time. "Did you die for anything in the end, Ingoldo? The mortal's here, after all your efforts. So much for your oath."

"So much for yours," says Finrod; "it looks like that eternal darkness you doomed yourself to wasn't that dark. Or eternal. So what was it all for? Do you even regret any of it?"

The dead can't lie. Artifice and deception are matters of the flesh, and they are buried with it.

"I didn't want you to die," Celegorm says.

"Well, that's a start!" says Finrod. "I can't say I'm glad to see you here, either."

"O Fair and Faithful one," says Celegorm, "spare me none of your pity. They are already whispering that you will be released soon, first of all the Exiles to walk again in Aman. So it's all turned out rather well for you, despite your evil cousins' machinations."

"I suppose it has," says Finrod, thinking.

The thing is, it was worth it. Beren's life mattered. It mattered that he saved it, even if he died to do so, even if Beren is dead now too (although word is that might be changing).

He did not do it expecting a reward.

"And my werewolf was bigger than yours," says Celegorm.

Finrod rolls his metaphorical eyes. "At least I actually killed mine."

Cousinly bickering is still kind of fun, even when you're dead.

Curufin, fuming outside the Girdle, would not agree.

After a time he's forced to conclude that the only thing he can do is head back to Himring.

The ride through Himlad, once as green and fair a land as any, does not improve his mood.

Also his burned hand is still hurting.

Look: here's the little stream where Celegorm caught a huge fish once; and here are the low hills where, a couple of centuries ago, they held some war games and Curufin's people thrashed Celegorm's decisively.

Here's the copse where, years before the Dagor Aglareb brought tentative peace to East Beleriand, Curufin and his son were surprised by a party of orcs, who took their small patrol all captive.

Tyelpë was just barely of age at the time. How trusting his eyes, then, how baby-soft his hair: how easily he had believed that his father would fix everything.

As for Curufin, he spent the hours-long ordeal learning anew what terror was, rendered compliant by the mere possibility that they could hurt his child.

They were fine, in the end. Celegorm rode up to the rescue while the orcs were still quarrelling over where to take them.

But Curufin remembers: how disabling love can be.

Meanwhile Fingon finds himself surrounded by a crowd of angry Iathrim in their home city.

He sets Maglor down on the floor and sets a hand on his sword-hilt, wondering if he is about to become a Kinslayer again.

(Fingon regrets Alqualondë more than anything; and he'd do it again, for Maedhros' sake. He knows this about himself.)

Before things escalate too far, Thingol shows up at the scene of the disturbance.

"We haven't met," Fingon says. "Fingon son of Fingolfin, High King of the Noldor in Beleriand. I've come for my cousin." He gives Thingol a rather dangerous smile.

Thingol thinks he might be in serious trouble. He attempts to adopt a conciliatory tone (which is really really hard for Thingol ok he's trying).

"He'll die if he's moved," he says, nodding to where Maglor is slumped against the wall, shivering.

"He'll die if he stays here!" Fingon says. "Is this the famed hospitality of your halls?"

"He has been offered every treatment he could ask for," Thingol says. "It is not the fault of Menegroth if he chooses to refuse them. Now tell me, son of Fingolfin, how came you through the Girdle of Melian – without her leave or mine?"

Maglor puts the pieces together. "Finno, you lied to me," he breathes, glancing at the box in Fingon's hand.

Fingon wonders if it would be diplomatically insensitive to kick Thingol.

"The jewel alone does not explain it," Thingol insists. "While I hold the Silmaril my daughter won, surely—?"

"I could have told you that, had you asked," says Maglor. "Silmarils aren't weapons! You can't use one as some sort of military defence."

Thingol is now questioning all his life choices.

He only took the Silmaril from Maglor in the first place because he thought it would protect his kingdom, and now—

Maglor is feeling resigned. He should have known Fingon's claim was too good to be true. Thingol still has the Silmaril, and Maglor can't leave Menegroth without it.

Face pale and set, he attempts to get to his feet, mostly unsuccessfully.

Fingon looks down at him. "Seriously, Makalaurë?" And when Maglor ignores him, he says, "Sorry about this," and kicks Maglor's bad leg – carefully, but still hard enough to hurt.

Maglor faints.

Fingon picks his limp body up. "The Silmaril isn't yours," he tells Thingol.

"The white ships of Olwë my brother's people were not yours, either," Thingol returns.

Fingon inclines his head, acknowledging the point. "I don't wish to start a war over the Silmaril," he says. Maglor is so cold and still in his arms. "My cousins have done enough for that cause lately. Only let me take my kinsman home."

Thingol hesitates. The iron box in Fingon's hand is so close, and Fingon is outnumbered, and he has his injured cousin to worry about—

It could all be over, if he took the second Silmaril. He'd never need to worry about his people's safety from invasion again.

"Elu," comes a voice from behind him, "enough of this. Let them go."

"Queen Melian," says Fingon, bowing his head.

She barely looks at him, meeting her husband's gaze instead. "Time and again you have disregarded me," she says. "Lúthien is lost, and yet you persist with this. Will you heed me now?"

Thingol stares at her, and then, finally, he waves his hand. The bristling guards move aside, allowing Fingon free passage down the corridor.

"I trust you can remember your way out," Thingol tells Fingon, and turns away.

Fingon looks at Melian. "Thank you," he says, "and I am very sorry about your daughter."

He has met Maiar before, of course, in Valinor: but Melian is still unsettling, with her implausibly flawless face and eyes that hold yet the memory of a time before Time.

"Little king," she says, "only hope that you will not know any such pain yourself."

Fingon manages a smile. "I'm good at that," he says. "Hope."

On that note he leaves Menegroth, carrying Maglor, and begins to make the long trek back through the Forest of Region, and thence to Himring.

Curufin has managed the journey significantly more quickly. On a crisp cold morning he rides back through Himring's gates.

Maedhros has been... managing. Not well, but he trusts Fingon.

Beloved, I will bring them back to you. Beloved, I will bring them back to you. Beloved, I will bring them back to you.

But here's Curufin by himself, looking pale and tired, and after all it was only a hastily-scribbled note, not an incantation.

Maedhros arrives at the gate at a run.

Scarce weeks ago it was the other way around, Maedhros riding into the fortress with Fingon's cloak only just concealing his bloodstained clothes: and Curufin met him as he came in and he can still feel the terrible jolt of knowledge in his stomach, and Celegorm is still dead.

How can it be borne?

A thought comes to Curufin and for a moment he thinks it the cruellest idea he has ever had, but Celegorm is dead and his hand is still burned and nobody expects any better of him anyway.

"They're dead," he says flatly, "they're both dead," and Maedhros just – stares at him.

(to be continued)

[thelordofgifs]

Part the eleventh! Maedhros gets to be a main character again after being sidelined for the last two parts.

He isn't enjoying it.

(Content warning for descriptions of the general aftermath of trauma, plus a briefly mentioned and not described in any detail panic attack.)

“I don’t,” says Maedhros, “I don’t – believe you.”

It’s very cold in Himring, suddenly. And has the wind always been this loud, or that just the blood rushing in his ears?

Over it he catches brief snatches of Curufin’s explanation: Maglor was already dead by the time they got to Menegroth, and Fingon was killed as they were trying to escape, and Thingol took the Silmaril as well despite Curufin’s best efforts.

“But,” Maedhros says, “but—”

Words have always come so easily to him, but now they’ve all dried up.

It’s just… cold.

Maedhros has known grief before, seen Amrod burn and his father burn and Celegorm bleed out in his arms.

This is different.

This is more painful than torture (and he would know), hollower than despair.

Maybe this is what they meant when they swore themselves to the Everlasting Darkness: that can't, at any rate, be any worse.

Fingon's sunshine smile dimmed forever, Maglor's lilting-laughing voice silenced – how could anyone bear that?

Maedhros can't, at any rate.

He starts to slip.

(This is what Maglor calls it when Maedhros isn't quite wholly present: Let him alone, he's slipping, I'll deal with it, and then their younger brothers are left sort of awkwardly standing there while Maglor talks Maedhros down from whatever precipice he's on, sometimes literally.)

(Leave them to it, Celegorm might say, flashing Curufin a careless affectionate smile: you know Káno's the favourite – with a wink that meant, although he rarely said it aloud, and you are mine.)

Celegorm is dead, Curufin reminds himself, and hardens his heart.

He has a Plan.

The thing is that Fingon might have been improbably lucky in a rescue mission once, but that's no reason to think the feat can be repeated. It's far more likely that Thingol will kill him, and take the second Silmaril too, and make Curufin's lie into a prophecy: and then where will they be?

Fortunately Curufin had been, you recall, hard at work starting a coup in Himring before he went on the Worst Road Trip.

It's now easy enough to take control of the fortress, while Maedhros sits like a glassy-eyed wraith at the council table and pays no attention to anything anyone says.

Curufin will not make the mistakes of Nargothrond again. Maedhros is still nominally in charge, and Curufin is a loyal and supportive brother: he will not discredit him, even to his own followers.

Maedhros is doing enough of that himself, anyway.

Case in point: one time Curufin suggests, rather tentatively, that since Fingon is dead and nobody knows where Turgon disappeared to, it might be time for the overlordship of the Noldor to return to the elder line of Finwë. Let Maedhros claim now the title he was born to, the title his father named him for.

Maedhros looks directly at him for the first time in a while, says, very precisely, "I will kill you if you say that again," and then walks out.

After that nobody finds it hard to believe, as Curufin implied a while ago, that the Lord of Himring has gone a little mad.

Maedhros himself barely notices any of this. There is a blizzard in his head, consuming him, making him shiver even when he huddles beside the warmest hearths in the castle, numbing him from the inside out.

For the first time in many centuries he longs for sleep, throwing himself nightly towards oblivion – but his nightmares are only getting worse, and there is nobody to soothe him when he wakes, however he might try to summon them.

It's over, Maglor might say, you're in Himring, it's safe; and Fingon would say, I'm here, I love you, I'm here. But memory is a poor substitute for them.

Also it's his fault that Maglor was injured, he only jumped in front of Carcharoth because Maedhros had frozen up, and then Maedhros left him – he might as well have dealt the killing blow himself.

As for Fingon, bold and beloved – did he set out to rescue Maglor for any reason other than that Maedhros loved his brother? Would he have gone were it not for Maedhros' sake?

How very like Maedhros, to love people, and doom them for it.

Meanwhile in Doriath:

[Can we call this the Better Road Trip or is that pushing it?]

Fingon and Maglor are of course Literally Fine.

At least Fingon is. Maglor's kind of in a state.

Reasoning that they don't need to worry about orcs while they're still inside the Girdle, Fingon has taken out the Silmaril for Maglor to hold.

This is keeping Maglor tethered to consciousness at least; unfortunately, that means he's constantly, ineffectually struggling against Fingon, trying to head back to Menegroth.

"Stop," he says tiredly, after a while. "Stop."

Fingon sets him down to lean against a tree and fetches him some berries from a nearby bush. "You can stop the hunger strike thing at least," he says.

"This is absurd," says Maglor, but he eats them.

"I agree," says Fingon. "I'm not taking you back to Menegroth, you might as well stop fighting."

"I can't," Maglor says, "you left the Silmaril with Thingol!"

"At least you have one," says Fingon. "That's closer than you've been since the Darkening! Stop complaining."

Maglor blinks at him. "A little harsh, Finno," he says, keeping his voice carefully neutral.

"I am sick of your stupid Oath and the stupid things it makes you do," Fingon says vehemently. He kicks at some leaves.

"Yes," says Maglor, sighing. "Yes, so am I."

Fingon takes the opportunity to clean and rebandage Maglor’s wounded leg.

Lúthien did her work well. There’s no trace of Carcharoth’s poison left in the wound; it would probably be of little concern by now if Maglor hadn’t deliberately torn it open like, five times.

“You’ve been fighting for a while,” Fingon observes.

“I didn’t want—” Maglor looks distressed. “After what Tyelko and Curvo did… and Lúthien was kind to me in spite of that. I didn’t want to repay her by attacking her father.”

“Then what’s changed?” Fingon asks, trying to be gentle. “You held the Oath off for centuries – can you not keep at it until we get back to Himring?”

Maglor stares at the Silmaril in his hand. “It doesn’t belong to him,” he says, deflecting.

“The one Morgoth has doesn’t belong to him either,” says Fingon, “and I don’t see you rushing off to Angband.”

“I can’t rush anywhere.”

“Well, whose fault is that?”

Maglor smiles reluctantly.

Curious, Fingon says, “Would you really have died, if I hadn’t come? Or would you have let them treat you?”

“I don’t know,” says Maglor. “I’d like to say I would have died. It’s the noble thing to do, isn’t it? Better dead than a murderer again.”

“I think so,” Fingon says, quietly.

Maglor is shivering a little, even in the light of the Silmaril. He’s lost a lot of blood.

Fingon gives him his cloak.

“I don’t want to go back to Himring without the other one,” Maglor says at last.

“Look, I’m not kidnapping you,” says Fingon. “Well, maybe a little. I can’t take you back to Menegroth, and you can’t even stand up, so forget trying to get there yourself.”

Maglor is silent.

Fingon takes a risk. “He misses you,” he says softly. “He’s been worrying.”

“Then why did he leave me?” Maglor asks, but then he sighs. “I didn’t mean that.”

“You know why.”

“The Oath, the Oath,” Maglor says, a little singsong. “I wonder who we’d be without it. Maybe it does turn you into your worst self, and take the best thing you have left.”

Fingon squeezes his shoulder. “Then keep fighting it,” he says, “and come back to Himring, and prove it wrong.” And when Maglor hesitates, “Come on, Makalaurë! You said it yourself: better dead than a murderer again. Why would that change?”

Maylor gives him an anguished look. “But better a murderer than failing him again,” he says.

This is one of the stupidest things Fingon has ever heard, and he tells Maglor so. "You don't think he wants you back more than he wants the jewel?"

"Of course I know that," Maglor says, waspishly. "I know he loves me. He loved me after Angband, too. That doesn't mean I didn't fail him then – and it doesn't mean I'm not failing now."

Fingon has said his fair share of cruel things to Maglor about that whole situation.

"Well, you can deal with your whole guilt complex when you're back there," he says firmly. "Come on. It's a long way to the Girdle still."

Maglor makes a token struggle when Fingon picks him up, but he doesn't say anything else until they've set off again.

"You're in the wrong story, Finno," he murmurs. "You can't keep being a hero in a tragedy. That's not how it works."

"Maybe," says Fingon; "or maybe the trick is to change what sort of story you're in."

Maglor thinks of Lúthien, who is dead now, and says nothing.

Back in Himring:

Grief makes Maedhros biddable. He eats when Curufin sends food up to his chambers, signs the papers he's given without reading them, and, when Curufin informs him that they should march on Doriath, says only, "Fine, I don't care."

Curufin was honestly not expecting this. Of course Maedhros would be upset, but this is like... like he isn't even Maedhros anymore, just a badly-made imitation.

Maedhros did not mourn like this for Celegorm.

Celegorm died in front of Maedhros and Maedhros didn't do anything.

Curufin doesn't pity him, won't pity him.

He has a war to start.

Damn Fingon for taking the Silmaril! It would have been useful for this.

The battle plan he settles on involves a siege. Their numbers aren't great enough to encircle all of Doriath, but if they march in sufficient force to the north-west of the Girdle, maybe Thingol will get scared enough to yield up the Silmarils/Maglor/Fingon (depending on who's alive)?

Failing that, it might be time to dam some rivers.

Okay, this isn't the greatest plan. He's doing his best! Maedhros is the strategist, not Curufin, and Maedhros is not being helpful at the moment.

Fortunately, Himring has been war-ready for four hundred years, and the only Noldorin military outpost in the East for the last decade; the muster is proceeding quickly, even without its lord's command.

Curufin also debates whether he should send to Caranthir and Amras for reinforcements.

Amras still has a good number of Green-elves under his command, but they lead a scattered, nomadic life. It could take a while to have them ready for war: and will they follow a Noldo lord against Thingol?

Amras is unpredictable – he has been since Losgar – but he loved Celegorm too.

Caranthir is close to Maglor, but he's also stubborn and contrary and has never got on very well with Curufin.

Probably neither of them will answer Curufin's summons: but they'll listen to Maedhros.

Best to leave them out of it for now, Curufin decides, but they should be prepared to have Amon Ereb open to newcomers should the attack fail.

That means he needs to have Maedhros write them a letter, which is tricky because Maedhros does not currently have the attention span necessary to write a full letter, even with Curufin dictating it.

Curufin writes up a copy, instead, and asks Maedhros if he'll write it out in his own hand and sign it.

Maedhros takes the draft from him and then pauses. "What's that on your hand?" he asks.

Damn. Curufin has been so careful—

"Oh, just a burn," he says breezily, "from a campfire while I was cooking some game."

Maedhros seizes his blistered right hand and stares at it.

Silence.

"It doesn't hurt overmuch," Curufin says, trying to keep his voice light, "now that it's been a few days—"

Maedhros has seen Morgoth's hands, blackened and withered: and he has witnessed, too, the madness of Carcharoth.

In one swift moment he drops Curufin's hand, draws a knife (he always keeps a knife on him! Why did Curufin forget?) and presses it to Curufin's throat.

Curufin tries to meet his grey eyes, wild in his ashen face, calmly.

"Nelyo, it's me," he says, attempting to mimic Maglor's even, soothing tones, "it's just Curvo."

He can only hear Maedhros' terrified shallow breathing: but after a long moment the blade wavers, and then Maedhros drops it.

Before Curufin can attempt some damage control, his brother has brushed past him out of the room.

Maedhros goes up to the battlements and has a small panic attack; once it's over he tries to think.

It's possible that Curufin just can't touch the Silmaril. He behaved atrociously to Lúthien, after all.

But if he's lying about that – and his story definitely included a bit where Thingol personally wrested the Silmaril from Curufin's hands – then what else could he be lying about?

How can Maedhros know that he is Curufin?

A servant of the Enemy wouldn't be able to touch the Silmaril either.

Okay, so maybe the real Curufin was captured on his way back from Doriath.

No. He wouldn't have had access to the Silmaril to be burned by it then.

Maybe Curufin never came to Himring from Nargothrond at all.

Maybe – oh, Manwë and Varda, but it's so plausible – maybe there isn't a Himring.

Don't the stones look artificial somehow, as if there's some small flaw in the illusion that they hold together at all?

Remember the Eagle, Russo, Fingon would say, you made it out, you're free; and Maglor would sing something, perhaps, or say, Feel the wind on your face, I promise you, it's real.

No – no. He's fallen for Sauron's tricks a thousand times before, he won't again. Maglor is in Mithrim, and Fingon back in Valinor (and what a ridiculous fiction, really, that Fingolfin's host could ever have crossed the Grinding Ice).

And Maedhros is in Angband with the Enemy fiddling with his mind – and he will never see either of them again, but they are alive. They are alive.

This is better, really.

(to be continued)

[aragornsrockcollection]

The silly post about Elrond’s healing just being very strong Dad Energy™️ made me want to put forth a theory I’ve had for a while about what Melian is the Maia of, and how that affects the powers of her descendants.

So it’s no secret that the Valar are a pantheon in the style of the Pre-Christian Europe, like the Greek and Norse pantheons; head-honcho god has bird/sky themes, and all the big archetypes are filled: war, nature, forge, spring, death/doom, chaos, sea, weaving/history, hunting, dancing, dreams, healing/medicine, stars, and pity, the last one being Nienna and a bit of an outlier who makes a lot of sense filling the role that Mary fills in Catholicism, which makes the whole group align better with Tolkien’s Catholic worldview of compassionate deities, a concept that was NOT prevalent in those pre-Christian gods.

A few main members of the archetypal pantheon are missing, One is a god of music, which makes sense because ALL the Ainur are gods of music due to the nature of the universe. Others are taken up by maiar, such as Arien and Tillion being the sun and the moon, Tillion being a Maia of Orome the hunter, which draws Artemis connections, and Arien being a Maia of Vana the ever young. Eonwe is the messenger and

Melian’s role is never expressly defined unlike Arien and Tillion and others. She’s associated with both spring and healing through Vana and Este, and her contribution to the song pre-children seems to be songbirds-more specifically teaching the nightingales to sing songs, since birds should fall under Manwe or Yavanna’s purview (she is said to be akin to Yavanna, but that’s vague and not fleshed out).

But she’s also seen as one of the more powerful Maia, and I don’t see that justified by being the Maia of songbirds. Again, music is ALL of the Ainur’s thing, and what do songbirds have to do with healing, the main power her descendants inherit?

Well, what do songbirds have to do with spring? What is the point of their songs?

It’s attracting a mate. Birds in spring is euphemistically associated with love and sex.

Melian is the only Maia we know of to marry one of the children, and this pantheon is MISSING a goddess of love and marriage and motherhood. Her daughter then goes on to have THE romance of legend, and while Luthien is acting out of love for Beren she is basically unstoppable.

We never see Luthien use her power any other way, outside of her love story, and the idea that she would NOT be as powerful when her songs were not in service of saving her love is actually pretty compelling to me. And also solves the problem of “Why did Luthien, who can put a spell on MORGOTH, let Celegorm and Curufin keep her hostage for a bit.”

The idea of Melian being the Maia of Love and Motherhood also makes sense in context of her abandoning Doriath. If her power comes from love of her husband and daughter, then the girdle was doomed once Thingol died whether she stuck around or not, so her leaving is more forgivable.

Love being such a huge theme in Tolkien’s work, it makes sense why Melian and her descendants are SO powerful. And why they are canonically the most beautiful creatures to walk the earth, as beauty and love are usually intertwined in these figures of mythology.

And Tolkien connects love and healing many times in his work. Aragorn working in the halls of Healing specifically orders Eomer to be the first person Eowyn sees, because her love for her brother is more true than her toxic obsession with him. Also as noted in the other post, his magic healing includes giving them a kiss on the forehead.

Faramir and Eowyn’s whole relationship plays out in the halls of healing, and Eowyn’s arc in this time is seeing no value in healing, either herself or others, until she finds love and hope in Faramir and basically in the same breath vows to become a healer.

Elrond’s compassion and Big Dad Energy and love for everyone is indeed what makes him the best healer in middle earth. And I’m going to argue there is a legit reason for that, with the source of his family’s healing talent being this world’s goddess of love. And of motherhood, which I think translates well to Elrond being everyone’s dad. Perhaps I should say “parenthood” since that is so obviously passed down.

Tl.Dr. Melian is the Maia of love, romantic and familial, which is the source of the Peredhil’s healing powers (and extreme attractiveness).

[buttershee]

Idc if the kitten girl who has nine girlfriends and leaked the nofly list uses a label you personally disapprove of she’s literally cooler than you

[cheezitthefuzz]

I keep hearing bits and pieces of this story and every one makes this person sound more fucking amazing

can anyone tell me the whole shenanigan?

[buttershee]

Basically a trans woman who’s a bisexual lesbian kitten therian who uses she/it pronouns and has nine girlfriends hacked into an airport via a public server and was able to leak the entire TSA no-fly list and announced it on its pink kitten blog with a “Holy fucking bingle. What?! :3” which is a pretty big cybersecurity breach and obviously everyone thought it was the coolest thing ever until the twitter mobs found out about the “bisexual lesbian” part and got pissed at her for being queer the wrong way. And it’s really really funny that they think they can tell a literal enemy of the state how to label her sexuality.

[vaspider]

It's always "be gay do crime" until the crime is against your self-constructed orthodoxy of queerness which you've convinced yourself will get the cishets to respect you for sure this time.

[vaspider]

Also I want to know if she's looking for a 10th girlfriend.

[bikerlorian]

[shrikeseams]

Unilaterally deciding that Eru lost all “illuvatar” rights no later than the drowning of Numenor. If you reaction to the babysitter calling you in a panic ‘cause the kid’s being disobedient is to nuke your children from orbit? I’m calling social services on you. You’ve lost parenting rights.

[lenin-it-to-win-it]

Legolas and Gimli get married at least 5 times and here’s why

[arrestedforabcrimes]

lord of the rings au where ‘the fellowship’ is just the name of the support group that everyone is doing their court mandated therapy at

[arrestedforabcrimes]

still fucking thinking ab this

legolas is there on grand theft auto because his car title is in thranduils name and he tried to leave the house after they had an argument and thranduil called the cops on him.

gandalf avoided criminal charges after his old smoking buddy sauroman tried to use his homemade fireworks to blow up a post office in protest against something something government overreach something but is still technically on parole. he stops going once his parole is done and everyone else is convinced that he’s dead

aragorns court mandated therapy is actually elrond mandated therapy since he decided that pitching a tent in the woods and dropping off the grid for two weeks to avoid his problems was a good idea and elrond’s only hope is for him to learn coping mechanisms that wont result in having to file a missing persons report.

merry and pippin were smoking weed