Please tell me more about de Círdan/Lalwen ship 😍
So I don’t know the origins of this ship, really, or even how I stumbled across it (it may have been this fic? I’m not sure), but it first appealed to me as a possible Gil-galad origin theory! Lalwen as Gil’s mother - and thus his claim to the throne being from his mother’s side, not his father’s - is a really interesting concept and honestly a stronger claim as the son of a G1 Finwëan rather than...the only guy left several generations down Arafinwë’s line. As for Círdan, he’s just great, and Gil’s other parent is sometimes said to be a Sinda, so it works for that too.
In my mind it was a secret relationship that ended up with a child they couldn’t keep for political reasons, and he was given to Fingon to raise instead (a different kind of political mess, but apparently easier to handle). I have multiple different Gil theories that I play around with, and I don’t often use this one anymore, but it is definitely fun.
Anyway, that’s how I started shipping them. My thoughts now are a little more complicated (in verses where they are not Gil’s parents I make them the parents of Littleheart/Ilfrin instead of Voronwë, who is Círdan’s nephew) but their love story stays pretty much the same in my mind: Lalwen is a diplomat to the Falas for her brother the High King, she and Círdan hit it off, it’s very much a Friends to Lovers slowburn situation. I see them as both very practical people, putting their responsibilities before any feelings they might have, and only getting together later in the First Age.
My Lalwen dies in the War of Wrath defending her little brother Arafinwë the way she couldn’t defend big brother Nolofinwë...and though she gets reembodied in the Second Age (and hangs out on Tol Eressëa with Voronwë and Ilfrin, who sailed at the end of the First Age), Círdan hangs out in Middle-earth doing his ship-building thing until well into the Fourth Age, so their reunion is a very long time coming. Lalwen doesn’t begrudge him that and she’s proud of him for everything he does, but she is very glad to have him back when the time finally comes.
I haven’t really written much fic about them? There’s this fic where I looked at their relationship through an aro lens, and this installment in my space/SW AU that features Gil-galad Lalwenion, but that’s it...Maybe for @finweanladiesweek I’ll write something for them - I wanted to last year, but I didn’t get it together in time!
