#isildurioni

[bretwalda-lamnguin]

Denethor being ambush predator coded whereas Aragorn is pursuit predator coded...

[anghraine]

This is maximally self-indulgent so I didn't add it to the other reblog, but the Denethor--Aragorn connection is honestly one of the funnest things about writing my Aranor fics. The basic premise is that the Númenórean throwbacks in LOTR are genderbent (usually to women, though Ivriniel and Finduilas of Dol Amroth become Túrin and Gwindor!). The most narratively central figure is Aranor (Aragorn), though, so I mostly think of the interconnected fics as "the Aranorverse."

Anyway, the Denethor--Aragorn connection is particularly fun in that verse because the first woman to rule Gondor is not Aranor, but the Ruling Steward Andreth (Denethor). For Aranor, getting the people of Gondor to accept her as not only heir of Elendil but as ruling queen is still a steep task—but not as steep as it would have been if the foundation had not been laid by Andreth's rise to the Ruling Stewardship and popular, largely successful rule over the decades since.

Andreth would never in a million years have wanted her actions to smooth Aranor's path, incidentally. They knew each other as younger women and she was one of the only people to realize that Aranor was a woman, much less heir of Isildur, and Andreth resented the hell out of "Thorongil" back in the day. Andreth knows her way around a sword and in some ways, would have very much preferred to live a Thorongil sort of life, but as one of the Steward's daughters and mother to the (then very young) heir to the Stewardship, her circumstances were quite different from Aranor's.

In any case, Andreth wanted Boromir to succeed her as had always been planned, and was devastated by his death. Still, she remained set on her remaining heir, her daughter Míriel, inheriting the Stewardship upon her death. Fortunately in some ways, she died before Aranor's return and never saw the parallels between her struggle to rule in her own right and not only as regent for Boromir during his minority, and Aranor's fight for the chieftainship of the Northern Dúnedain given the N. Dúnedain's pride in the father-to-son line of male chieftains, or how both struggles would culminate in Aranor's ascension as first ruling queen of Gondor.

[bretwalda-lamnguin]

I actually do like Aragorn, but some of his fans make it difficult at times. He's clever, ambitious and has bags of political guile! He's also very like Denethor! Why deny his strengths and virtues? He wants to be king of Gondor for its own sake because he thinks he would rule well, he's more than willing to put the work in to get there and that makes him cool and interesting.

[anghraine]

croclock replied to your post: ibmiller replied to your post: yavieriel replied...

THAT LITTLE MALICIOUS SMILE WHEN HE SAYS ‘NO’ MAKES ME SO FUCKING PISSED

subtlety: how does it work