#roleplay meme answer

[salmaganto]

⍤ : What does your muse’s voice sound like? Is it light? High pitched? Scratchy? Deep?

I! Have! Done! Research! Salgant is absolutely a baritone, edging toward the upper register thereof. If we take Valinor upper-class music as vaguely operatic - and let’s, for funsies! - then I believe that you are looking at something like a Verdi baritone, or charakterbariton. The quality of his voice is a little too harsh for a true lyric baritone.

(Please bear in mind that I am not an opera buff, so I am going largely off of Wikipedia and a few audio files of “yeah that sounds about right to me.”)

However, it should be noted that he does not always sing in that style! In fact, it’s pretty rare that he does, so he won’t achieve the quality of a true specialist in the type. He’ll be the first to tell you so, too, but he is quite versatile and capable of multiple musical styles, including a few esoteric ones that frankly I don’t have the expertise to talk about either.

[salmaganto]

Talk about Ecthelion!

“Oh, Ecthelion. Where to begin! I would never want to say anything unflattering about a peer, you know, so I cannot in truth tell you much. He is a passable flautist, of course, and one can’t fault his courage. His House is a pillar of the city, though I am never quite sure what he himself has to do with that.”

[salmaganto]

What if you had not been captured?

Ah, there's a painful question! I think it likely that I would have died; I'm not certain I could have kept the pace with those who escaped. Unpleasant, but true.

[salmaganto]

☣: Have they ever been severely ill? If so, did it leave an effect on their overall health in the long run?

WHY YES AND ALSO YES. I am stretching this to mean injured as well as ill, because I can and because elves.

Let me tell you about the incident with Salgant’s foot and why it vexes him right up until he dies! So, this was on the Ice, right? He’s accepted that he is going to help the Noldor not die, because watching women and children starve to death is not his idea of a good time, Kinslayers or not. But he’s not happy about it.

There is an accident. What kind of accident is difficult to say, as in, there are ever so many options, but it is quite severe. I think some sort of crushing injury. Anyway, Turgon sees to it that Salgant is treated by the Noldor healers! They are very good and they manage to save the foot after quite a lot of trouble and probably some surgeries.

And Salgant has now been exposed to more Noldor than just Turgon, Elenwe, and a few kids. Being Salgant, he has a big problem staying angry at people, even if he has an excellent reason to be (see: Kinslaying). This is where he starts to really pick up Quenya - Turgon had been speaking Telerin with him - and also starts to forgive the Nolofinwion contingent. (Does this go over well with the Teleri he was originally guiding? NOEP.)

Anyway. He kept the foot, but he still gets a lot of nerve pain and sometimes it goes out from under him. He has an ankle brace and a cane, and uses them both. This is also my explanation for the canonical fact that he’s the only Gondolin lord to ride horses! Managing a horse strikes me as more work than just walking somewhere, so a horse is actually a mobility aid for Salgant over longer distances.

[salmaganto]

💊: Have they ever dabbled in drugs? If so, what kinds?

Salgant has dabbled! Wine is practically a staple in Gondolin, of course, but he’ll also try any food or food-like substance that is offered to him, from the Vanyarin equivalent of pot brownies to Nandorin magic mushrooms. (Salgant why.) I do not think he is prone to good trips, though, so he may not try them TWICE, mind you! Nor is he the kind to get sloppy drunk; he hasn’t done that since he was a music student in Alqualonde. Never again, says Salgant. Never again.