bi-widower-dads

[bi-widower-dads]

Hello! I was wondering whether it would be okay to submit my very belated reincarnation inspired fic to your ao3 story collection? I am writing more chapters for it but I cannot predict when it will be finished. I haven't given up on it however.

Yes, absolutely! Go for it, and we look forward to seeing it finished :)

[bi-widower-dads]

AND TO END BARDUIL MONTH HOW ABOUT SOME BIRD SONG? @bi-widower-dads

Bard knew many things about elves — things that came only with continued exposure over many decades. The kinds of things that did not make it into the stories. For example: Elvish trances were much like human sleep in the sense that such restfulness was deeply tainted by their mood and surroundings.

"Do you hear them?" The Elven King murmured, barely cracking open an eye to prove to Bard his awareness.

"The squab?" Bard had to take a moment and focus his ears, trying to find a sound beyond the cooing. Pigeons were not Bard's favorite bird, though he still liked them far more than the rest of Esga- Dale. Than the rest of Dale. "Quite the racket, if I am to be honest, my lord."

"Thranduil." The Elven King corrected precisely as he had every time. "And yes. The doves of Eryn Galen sing when they are pleased. Listen closely, as you did the thrush. Only then will you know why."

Understanding the language of the birds was a gift, Bard knew, but he still struggled with it. Yes, the birds helped him slay the dragon, Smaug, but the little song birds had more to lose should the people of the lake died that day. Pigeons... Doves... Squab... Whatever they wished to be called, they were less keen to talk to Bard (and harder to understand in the bargain).

The coos repeated. Loud, clear. Present. "Mates." Bard's eyes opened in surprise when the sounds finally translated themselves in his mind. "They have found each other, and they are happy despite the end of the season drawing near. They will build a life together."

Elven King Thranduil's lips curled into the smile as he stood, a sweeping motion so smooth that Bard's trained eyes could still only catch a fraction of it. With a coo of his own, Thranduil coaxed the pair to him, each dove landing on his outstretched hands. He balanced them there, whispering something to them only he and the birds could understand, before he offered the thicker of the two to Bard.

It was a strange sensation, holding a bird so oddly sized. It was smaller than a hunting hawk and yet much larger than the pretty mountain flocks. Bard hardly knew what to do with his fingers as he tried desperately not to wrangle the beast like an undignified meat bird.

"They will feast here tonight with us, in celebration of their long life ahead." Thranduil declared, his smile unwavering as he slipped in closer to Bard. He was taller and his many layers took up significant space, yet Thranduil's presence was never an intrusion into Bard's own sphere of comfort. "And perhaps, if we are equally as lucky, we will share in their bounty as well."

Bard balked at the thought that the Elven King might eat birds after lying to them, the part of his brain more attuned to the mortals of his land speaking up well before the part that assured him Thranduil would never. Thranduil, who pressed in close enough that his skin found Bard's, reuniting the doves in their possession. "Their bounty?"

"Love."

[bi-widower-dads]

For the "last frost of spring" prompt on the @bi-widower-dads Barduil Month 2025 bingo card . No warnings, modern "au", 1.8k.

old gods

It runs counter to everything Thranduil should be, but it’s always the same – every year of his terribly long life, Thranduil mourns when winter dies. The shape of winter has changed over the eons. Some years, if it’s been mild, Thranduil misses the terrible storms that used to roar down from the north, spat from Angband’s maw. In years where cold grips his small corner of the world from the last day of autumn to the first days of summer, he dreams of warm winds weaving their way through the Misty Mountains to wake the new leaves in their buds. It seems to be Thranduil’s curse, that he is never satisfied with what he has.

Still, Thranduil thinks, as he steps out into what will be the last frosty morning of the dying winter – no matter the length of the winter, its harshness or its mildness, he misses the frost when it leaves.

Thranduil picks up the newspaper off his front step and tucks it under his arm, buttoning his coat against the stiff wind with the other hand. He locks his front gate behind him, although there is nothing inside his home that he would miss if it were gone. It’s the principle of the thing more than anything else, and Thranduil wishes to set a good example for the young families in the neighborhood, all of whom are clearly taken with what appears to be an island of tranquility in the heart of one of humankind’s largest cities. On his kinder days, he admires their optimism; on his crueler days, he’s appalled by their naïveté. Even when the world is kind, it always has teeth.

It was never Thranduil’s intention to dwell in a city. He thought he would wander the woods until the woods withered to nothing. But all of Thranduil’s kin are gone to the Undying Lands, in times so distant that humans have forgotten them entirely, and after so many eons in the woods, Thranduil found himself growing lonely. If someone had told him at the beginning of the Third Age that he would one day choose to dwell entirely in the company of humans, he would have laughed at them. But the Third Age changed many things for Thranduil. Once his eyes were open, he could not close them again.

He sees them everywhere, in every face. It has been so long now, and the world has grown so busy and wide, that every person Thranduil passes on the street might hold an echo of his mortal husband and children. Thranduil has learned to live alongside it. Learned that those he treasured most have not left Arda entirely, and learned that it does not make him miss them any less.

Life in the city can be varied or mundane, and today, Thranduil opts for the mundane variety. His favorite tea shop, the one with the coziest interior and the best pastries, somewhere he can spend all day if he so chooses. He cuts a striking figure wherever he goes, but the staff have long since grown used to him. Thranduil ducks in from the street, leaving the cold behind, and breathes in deep, picking up the soft, familiar scents. Then he steps up to the counter.

The employee who’s meant to be working the register is currently stocking the pastry case. Thranduil is nothing if not patient, so he waits, wondering which of the baristas he’ll encounter this morning. He’s here frequently enough to know them by name, along with a few details of their lives, and he always asks. The manager mentioned some time ago that they had hired a new barista. Perhaps Thranduil will meet them today.

The employee looks up, spots Thranduil through the glass of the pastry case, and tries to jolt upright, only to hit his head. Thranduil expects a curse word. Instead: “Ow,” the employee says ruefully, and an odd jolt drifts through Thranduil’s veins. “Sorry. I’ll be right with you.”

“Take your time,” Thranduil says. “I can wait.”

He does not want to wait. Part of him wants to flee back into the cold, to mourn the last day of winter and everything that’s left him behind in peace. He resists the urge to rise up on his tiptoes and peer over the case, to get a good look at the man crouching there. The man will rise to his feet soon enough, and Thranduil will acquaint himself with what will become another familiar face in a city of millions. There is nothing to fear. Thranduil has lived so long that the world holds no more surprises for him.

Thranduil should have known better than such a thought. The new employee rises from behind the counter, still rubbing his head, and takes his place behind the cash register, and for the first time in millennia, Thranduil experiences a surprise that shifts the ground beneath his feet.

It is not him. He knows it cannot be him. Mortal souls leave Arda behind in death, never to return, and through all the long years of Thranduil’s life, he has met mortals aplenty that have borne more than a passing resemblance to Bard of Dale, Bard the Bowman, Bard the Dragon-slayer, Bard who captured Thranduil’s heart and took it with him when he left this world. At first, Thranduil felt a surge of anticipation and pain at the sight of mortals who resemble Bard, but he discovered a tell, one that dispels every fancy and delusion Thranduil has to the contrary. It is in the eyes. A mortal man may look like Bard. But Thranduil has never seen Bard’s eyes since they closed for the last time – until today.

They are Bard’s eyes, unquestionably. Thranduil could not fail to recognize them, and still worse, the man resembles him, too. Younger, perhaps, than he was when Thranduil met him first, but the same man. Thranduil stares, his heart breaking anew, and Bard looks back. “You must be Thranduil,” he says. “They told me about you.”

Thranduil must choose between finding his feet and finding his voice, and opts for the former. “Sorry,” Bard says. “That sounded bad. It was all good things, really. They said you come in a lot, and you’re friendly – and you tip pretty well – and, uh –”

He trails off. Thranduil decides he can risk a word. “And?”

Bard winces. “And they said you were really hot,” he says. Thranduil cringes. “I don’t know for sure about the other stuff yet, but – they weren’t wrong.”

Thranduil has the capacity for more words at the moment, but he’s unsure which ones to use. “Sorry,” Bard says again. “I shouldn’t have said that. I swear I’m not usually like this.”

“It is early,” Thranduil says. Four words. This is what he has been reduced to. “I have found that people are rarely at their best before eight am.”

Bard laughs ruefully at that, and Thranduil takes the chance to study him in more depth. Bard’s face is the same, and his eyes, and the way he wears his hair, but there are differences, too – tattoos spiraling up his forearms, a piercing in one ear, things that have become the norm in this day and age but are utterly incongruous on the king of Dale. “I hear you, but it’s still not an excuse,” Bard says. “What can I get for you today?”

Thranduil orders his usual on autopilot, and for some bizarre reason, elects to pay cash. Bard’s fingers brush his as he lifts the bills and coins out of Thranduil’s hand, and a spark travels through Thranduil’s veins, igniting a desire that’s grown unfamiliar to him in the countless years since the King of Dale’s death. He studies Bard’s hands, scarred and callused in a way that speaks to harder work than that of a barista. Bard’s ring fingers – both of them – are bare.

“Here’s your change,” Bard says, counting it back into Thranduil’s palm. “You can go ahead and have a seat. I’ll bring it out to you when it’s ready.”

Thranduil nods and retreats on wobbly legs, his steps unusually hesitant. He knows it is not possible, knows that no human soul but one has ever returned from beyond the spheres of the world, and yet he is certain all the same. Bard is here. How is he here? And why? And does the answer to that question matter even slightly? Thranduil knows there will be no answers. Even when he sang hymns of praise and prayer to Eru Iluvatar, he never received an acknowledgment, let alone a response. At his most cynical moments, Thranduil actually believed that his fellow Elves were making it up. For Iluvatar to answer a prayer Thranduil was never foolish enough to make, and to answer it now of all times, would be particularly out of character.

No, Thranduil decides, the answer does not matter. Having the answer will change nothing. Bard is here, and as long as Thranduil continues to return to this tea shop and Bard remains employed, Thranduil will run the risk of seeing him. Thranduil rests his head in his hands and wonders quite seriously if that is something he can survive.

“Here’s your pastry.” Bard sets it down on a plate in front of Thranduil, along with a knife and fork rolled in a paper napkin. “And here’s your tea.”

Thranduil looks down at the tea. “I have never seen foam art in a tea latte.”

“I think that’s kind of why they hired me,” Bard admits. “The boss said she’s thinking of starting an Instagram. Or a TikTok.”

If that is the case, Thranduil will be having a conversation with the boss. He will keep the tea shop solvent himself rather than allow social media to turn it into a destination. “What do you think?” Bard asks, and Thranduil glances up at him. “Of the art. I don’t usually go this concrete with it, but –”

Thranduil sees nothing concrete about it at all – the ghostly shape of an elk very like the one he once rode into battle, a species that has long since faded into history. “Why did you choose this image?”

“I guess it spoke to me,” Bard says. “It was going to be that or a tree.”

“You are an artist,” Thranduil says without thinking, and Bard laughs, startled. “Thank you. It is lovely.”

“Any time,” Bard says. “I’m taking mostly morning shifts – for reasons – and if you come in as often at the others say you do, we’ll be seeing a lot of each other.”

Of course they will. Of course even the most mundane aspect of Thranduil’s daily existence is not immune to this last surprise the world has chosen to hurl at him, a surprise he welcomes and dreads in almost equal measure. And yet – for thousands upon thousands of years, Thranduil has mourned, grieved, sworn that he would give anything for even another minute with Bard. Now he has had several minutes with Bard, and should he keep to his routine, he will have still more. Thranduil should not be wary. Thranduil should be grateful for the unexpected piece of time.

“Yes,” he says to Bard, allowing a cautious smile to come to his face, his eyes never straying from Bard’s. “I believe we will.”

taglist: @dilettantefeminist @nocompromise-noregrets @pluto-lichen @migrainewarrior @myeaglesong @nuredhel @carinatae @pomgore @hibernia-1

[bi-widower-dads]

*emerges from the depths* BARDUIL! MONTH! BUTTERFLIES!

@bi-widower-dads I'M RUSTY BUT I'M HERE FOR THE DADS

[bi-widower-dads]

awakening

For Barduil Month 2025 @bi-widower-dads, a combination of the "new life" and "planting seeds" prompts! around 950 words, canonverse, post-BotFA.

It’s been close to six months since Thranduil first rode into Dale’s ruins at the head of a column, and Bard recalls thinking it was a strange sight indeed. The Elves, arrayed in golden armor; Thranduil, clad in grey, astride an elk with a silver circlet atop his head. Bard remembers, too, how Thranduil’s eyes were clear and cold, like the snow-skies that would cloak Dale and starve the life from Bard’s people. Elves are like stars, he once heard his mother say. They shed light but no warmth.

It was true of Thranduil, Bard thought, but after the dragon’s fire and the flames of Thorin Oakenshield’s jealousy and rage, Bard was through with heat. He welcomed cold, and certainty, and Thranduil provided both. He also provided food, in generous amounts, enough to tide Bard’s people over for the winter. And even that was not the extent of Thranduil’s generosity. He promised to return to Dale in the spring, with yet more supplies.

In return, Bard promised payment. The dwarves had paid what they owed at last, and Bard and his makeshift council pored over their accounts and came up with a sum, which Bard presented to Thranduil. Thranduil looked down at it, then up at Bard, his expression carefully neutral. What is this?

The sum was too small. Bard knew it, and so did Thranduil, and guilt curdled in his mouth as he spoke. Payment for your assistance. It’s not much, but it’s the best we can offer.

No, Thranduil said, not unkindly. There is no payment between friends. I will see you in the spring.

Until that moment, Bard had not been sure at all that he could call himself Thranduil’s friend – or indeed, that Thranduil cultivated any friends at all. Light, but no warmth, and sure enough, the snow that fell on Thranduil’s cheeks and caught in his eyelashes did not melt. Thranduil inclined his head to Bard, then turned away, and there was nothing Bard could do but watch him leave. And in the months that have followed, he’s often thought of the Elvenking, of his halls deep within Mirkwood. Why he would refuse Bard’s offer of payment, and why he promised to return in spring.

And here he is, riding a white horse to replace the elk that was slain in the Battle of the Five Armies, at the head of a column once more. The soldiers who follow him are dressed not in gold, but in brown and green, and there are fewer of them than there were before – and considerably more wagons in their place. As the king of Dale, it’s Bard’s prerogative to wait inside the city, for visitors to be presented to him, but Bard is already terrible at following royal customs. He saddles a horse and rides out to meet the Elves, his ragtag personal guard struggling to catch up.

Thranduil’s brought the column to a halt well before Bard reaches him. It’s Bard’s city he’s approaching, and yet Bard’s the one who feels off-balance as he reins in his horse, searches for the right words. “I did not look to see you here.”

“Did you think I would forsake my word?” Thranduil raises his eyebrows, and Bard struggles to reconcile the aloof, icy Elvenking he met in the winter to the creature before him. In spring, Thranduil’s hair is strung with early wildflowers, the circlet on his head woven with gold. There’s color in his pale cheeks, and a spark in his eyes that captures all of Bard’s attention. “Dwarves might be faithless, but my people are not – and myself least of all.”

“Of – of course,” Bard says, stumbling on his response. “My promise of payment, also, is one I intend to keep.”

“There is no need,” Thranduil says. “It is in my kingdom’s best interest to ensure that yours flourishes, and in my interest to ensure that our alliance remains strong. My people have come to help yours sow your first seeds.”

Bard opens his mouth, and Thranduil interrupts him. “We have brought seeds as well, and some saplings. Dale was once famous for its orchards, and I would like to walk in their shade once again. This way.”

He leads Bard down the row of wagons, describing what’s contained in each, and naming the Elves, too, who’ve come to lend their expertise. Lake-town was a village of fisherman, not of farmers, a fact which Thranduil handwaves away. “You will learn one harvest at a time, just as my people did when we first learned to tend to crops. All will be well.”

He’s different. Bard can’t say what’s changed in him, unless all Elves blossom with the coming of spring. Awe-inspiring in the cold, enchanting as the weather turns. Every so often Bard forces himself to look away from Thranduil, just long enough to clear his head. It’s never long before he looks back again.

“It is not much,” Thranduil says, as he completes Bard’s tour of the impossible gifts he’s brought to Dale, “but it is the best I can offer.”

“I cannot repay you,” Bard says. “If it was within my power to grant a request of yours –”

“It’s within your power indeed,” Thranduil says. He extends his hand.

To shake, Bard thinks, and it’s with that intention that he takes Thranduil’s hand. He shakes firmly, but then he struggles to let go, and as the moments stretch out, it occurs to him that he must do something. Instead it’s Thranduil who moves, Thranduil who raises Bard’s hand to his mouth to press his lips to his knuckles. And for all that has been said about the cold brilliance of Elves, Thranduil’s kiss feels to Bard like the first blush of spring sunlight against his skin.

[bi-widower-dads]

I joined @officialtolkiensecretsanta this year, and got to be Secret Santa for @nocompromise-noregrets . I hope you love this private moment as much as I enjoyed drawing it!

[bi-widower-dads]

for my @officialtolkiensecretsanta - a reimagining of Edmund Leighton’s classic chivalric painting, god speed.

[bi-widower-dads]

My secret Santa gift for the @officialtolkiensecretsanta for @tinnurin!

Two kings enjoying festive mulled wine together in winter.

[bi-widower-dads]

Elderflower & Pears (Barduil, 1000+ words.)

A drabble for the ‘snowmelt’ prompt as part of Barduil Month 2025. Thanks to @bi-widower-dads for putting this event together!

CW: grief, smut, and cultural differences. Also Dain and co are here because I’d miss him if he wasn’t.

The first time Bard slit his hand open on the water, he came up to his father’s hip. A hook got lodged in his palm, and something caused it to tug rather than unfurl - he still remembers the yelp, the hot slice of pain, thick bright drops of blood blotting the murky water. His father’s face didn’t change at all as he packed the gooey red hole with a towel, muttering about how tools aren't toys. Once he was patched up, Brenn pulled their dory to the shoreside and told Bard to run along home. He made no argument, though he wanted to stay. His family did not abide dead weight.

In those days, the most valuable items Bard could imagine, the image that popped into his head when he heard words like “rich” and “gold” and “king,” were those scarce artifacts of Dale’s glorious toy markets, scattered around the edge of the forests and half-buried at the bank of the lake. No one forgot the halcyon days of the past, it’s linen babies with silver thread hair and boxes of gold plate shuddering from the winding mechanisms within. A handful survived the city’s destruction, their initial purpose of play quickly discarded so that the baubles might be treated as art.

With what remained of that pale yellow daylight, Bard voyaged as deep as he dared into the woods to visit one such ornament. Completely unreachable within the shallow pit of sand in an abandoned well, its walls lined with moss and grime, Bard could lean in and gaze upon a tarnished golden teapot, squat and round, the lid still screwed on tight. In his dreams, he’d see it at the center of his family’s wooden supper table, dispensing a stream of ichor as sweet and smooth as gold.

Bard doesn’t take a crown. His people are not as bound to ritual as their dwarven neighbors, and the victory is tarnished besides. He would’ve rather had his warm, dry bed with its threadbare sheet and ruddy pillows, the little box he kept Bain’s milk teeth in and the heart of sticks Sigrid twined for him when she was small. With all of it gone, the new lord’s mood is decidedly non celebratory. The Great Hall is swept up quick enough, but outside, the morning air is thick with coal smell. When he goes to inspect the balcony, all he sees for miles is piled wreckage and sparse flowers tossed on freshly-filled graves.

There comes a morning where the sun rises over the lake and allows Bard to see his finest kill made into a meal. Smaug’s felled body swarms with sea life, pike feasting on his eyeballs and snakeheads nibbling at his tail. Around where the black arrow sticks out from the dark cubic jewels coating his belly, whole schools of minnows have attached themselves to feed on his open wound, their threadish little wiggling forms like stubble on a man’s face, or maggots in a carcass. Nothing on two legs dares to approach, but fish don’t know such suspicions.

Bain could not bear the sight, and Sigrid has already busied herself. Bard brings Tilda with him to the shore with her mousy brown hair a mess from her pillow and watches as she peers down into the surface of the water. In her eyes, this remnant of the greatest calamity of their lives becomes a mystifying work of art. He may not be a Bargeman anymore, but his heart still swells with anticipation when he gazes upon the cloud of tapered shapes swirling beneath the surface of the water. All those fish! All the coin he’d get, if he netted them! Thank the Valar Bard’s aim was true, that the madness which struck him that black night was not in vain. Pride fits nicely into the amorphous blend of shock, relief and terror that torments him as he crosses the threshold of Dale’s great hall, breathing in the ash and dust and telling himself this is home now.

He isn’t sure what to do with it. As always, Bard defers to authority.

“Gaun yersel, lad.” Dain says once the last of the dead is safe underground. Bard doesn’t know what it means, but he gathers that it’s supposed to be assuring. “The hard part is over.”

“What do you call what comes next?”

He smiles joylessly, a flick of teeth buried in the bronze and silver net of his beard.

“The most miserable job you’ll ever have.” He reaches up to clamp a gloved hand around Bard’s shoulder. “Don’t fret, if at first you seem unfit for it. Happens to the best of us.”

It’s hard not to believe him, criss-crossed with scar tissue as he is, eyes bright beneath the rim of the crown, above that thrice-broken nose. Dain and his hill-dwarves are a less motley crew than their western kin, squat strong fellows who move with intent within engraved, well-worn metal armor, forged in days gone by.

After Bard’s coronation, one of them approaches in the livery of Dain’s house to give his daughters something. It’s a little beige sack, drawn shut by twisted bronze tassels, resting on a velvet pillow. Barn leans over to see what’s inside when Sigrid opens it, and a pile of engraved silver beads wink back at him. A gift from the new queen, the dwarf says, with all apologies; she is currently en route from her homeland, so she cannot present it herself.

Sigrid moves hastily to hide it in her cloak. Half the room has paused to look at her, and she dislikes uninvited attention. In the ensuing days, Tilda claims the little sack entirely for herself, rolling about the little beads in her palm with earnest fascination. She pins one to the white strap of her night-coif, and a handful to Bain’s raggedy old tunic, slowly phasing the remains into their household’s wardrobe one button at a time. Pride blooms in Bard’s breast. Now is not a time for happiness, but this is par for the course; he has always maintained his sanity with such secret joys.

A small clot of citizens, most of them women, have taken it upon themselves to care for the parentless children left behind by the dragon. Bard visits when he can, ruffling hair and passing out chunks of lembas, their faces lost blinking. Most of them were already urchins; none of his neighbors’ babes, thank the Valar, but Bard recognizes one little boy as the son of his old bluefish buyer. He is dead now, drowned under the wreckage of his house, but the women manage to dig up his brother, Myron. He surfaces after an evening to fetch his nephew, pale and unshaven.

One of the caretakers is a widow, with long lashes and a round face. Her name is Eira, the mother of two grown-up girls herself. She has soft, wrinkled skin, tight brown-red curls encircling her skull. In the dark cold hours of the night, Bard sneaks into a closet with Eira under one arm and a bedroll under the other - her breasts roll against his collarbone sweetly, her sex a warm slick nest. In the morning, they greet each other seamlessly, as if he wasn’t spending himself in her not six hours earlier. The tension in Bard’s veins recedes for a time, but after a fortnight, it’s rejoined him, thrumming in his gristle as he walks Dale’s dusty stone streets.

Where it’s coming from isn’t a mystery.

Bard had never seen the lord of the corrupted forest before he became one himself. He always knew he existed, an Elf King buried under the brush in the parts of the forest he knew to give a wide berth. The wood elves who patrolled the border wore helms that hid their eyes, dispensing sparse exports of funguses and fanciful wine bottles, foreign, proud and far away.

In his head, Bard had imagined the Elvenking to be a nymph with a booming voice and flaming green eyes, draped in moody green regalia embroidered with all sorts of leaves and thorns, his crown of tarnished gold roses mounted to the rim of a grandiose mask.

The ancient elf who stalks the edge of the displacement camp bears his face entirely, a waxy mask of aristocratic disinterest with cloud-grey eyes as impenetrable as frosted glass, though he pins Bard with enough wry smiles for him to tell he’s been selected for royal favorite. Before it died, Bard watched him direct the reins on a great Bull Elk with long rigid fingers sheathed in black leather gloves - off the battlefield, he studs those same strong knuckles with ostentatious rings.

In illustrations, all elves wear interwoven braids and earthy tunics buttoned up to the gullet. If such standards are recognized amongst them, perhaps Thranduil balks them on purpose.

Gossamer hair sweeps about his shoulders, a similar capish effect as the steel-winged getup he wore on that cold morning he first flew into town.

His collar parts to reveal his sternum like lily petals around dusty ovaries, accentuated by a nest of silver tendrils pinned to his collar, what Bard assumes is an ersatz badge of office. His robes are dark and severe - so much death is strange and dire for immortals, Bard supposes - following the form of broad shoulders and parting to reveal the longest legs Bard’s ever seen. Bard’s eyes come right up to his neck, where an inch-deep jugular notch vibrates with life each time Thranduil speaks.

Three nights after the battle, Bard’s nerves are still singing, his sleep uneasy in this drafty, too-big bed. He dreams that Thranduil and him are alone together in Dale’s great hall, coupling atop a long wooden table.

The Thranduil of his sleep is not the real elf, a dreamy, drunken variant who knows no shame and bestows his body unto him like a bounty, eager and merciful all at once. Bard jerks his hips into him and he strokes the new king’s shoulders in encouragement, dense thighs twined around Bard’s waist, grinding his black hairy chest against Thranduil’s lower belly. His left leg clings more weakly than his right; he’s got a wound somewhere on that side, Bard has gathered, though he doesn’t know the details. In the dream, he does know, has had it explained to him at length, freely gifted with all the generosity of the heart an eternal like this can muster.

Bard makes the most of their closeness, kissing his sallow breasts and sucking his sinewy neck, long dark lashes heavy over his lidded, murky green eyes. Thranduil’s form smells of dry sage and dewy verbena; his mouth tastes of everything Bard has ever hungered for, elderflowers and pears, the bottomless rest of suspension in soothing nothingness.

Bard awakens bathed in the pale lilac light of dawn - writhing facedown on the mattress, his cock stiff and weeping. He finishes himself fast and silent, twisting his wrist furiously to the thought of crushing his lips on the elvenking’s, buried in him like a dagger in its sheath.

The sudden upswell of lust is embarrassing, in the cold light of the morning. But it’s a flimsy, performative embarrassment, more a petty offering to the pride of two old men than the sting of true shame. Bard is hardly the first great lord to be seized by desire for an elf. They’re enticing creatures, all are in agreement about that, if arrogant and stubborn and strange. To imagine the cold brush of Thranduil’s arcuate lips and feel a twinge of hunger is not a sin. Even Dain knew him to be fair, and labeled him so in the hearing of his entire host, if only to mock him as unmanly.

Besides. The needs of Bard’s flesh might be sated, but his spirit is not so easily repaired. No matter how high Bard rises, the mother of his children lives on beneath his breastbone, her memory hiding in the beats of his heart. Noma slipped away into a spring fever years ago, when Sigrid was newly a young girl and Tilda still a baby. Afterwards, it took several seasons for Bard to feel want for anyone, woman or man. The loss was too fresh, the future too uncertain.

Perhaps now that the ground beneath his feet is solid, Bard might allow that wound to smooth over and close.

[bi-widower-dads]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: The Hobbit - All Media Types Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Bard the Bowman/Thranduil (Tolkien) Characters: Bard the Bowman (Tolkien), Thranduil (Tolkien) Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, First Kiss, I Will Go Down With This Ship, This is my first time writing Barduil so don’t bite my head off, Barduil Month (Tolkien), Tags Are Hard, Barduil - Freeform, Domestic Fluff

***

For ChicotFP.

So, uh…hello? I don’t know what I’m doing. 

Quick little one-shot that popped into my brain after yet another wild AU headcanon sharing session with my beloved friend… so basically, this is for you, my beautiful, brave lady, because you said this is where they should kiss…so I made them kiss for you? As I’ve said, I’m in a romantic mood today, and this was flowing way too easily not to do at least something small with it, and I also felt like trying a different style to what I normally do, and, uh…I’m rambling like always, you know me like that, don’t you. Anywayyy… I hope you like it.  ❤️ @bi-widower-dads

[bi-widower-dads]

Hi Friends,

My next fic for Barduil Month 2025 is here:

Those Who Talk Don't Know

No TW//CW. a low-stakes museum meet-cute for our best bi dads and one little girl who has a self-assigned mission

our quarterly reminder to love and protect a community's "weird" kids

[bi-widower-dads]

Hi Friends,

I Will Return as Summer Rain

I have a new fic up now for Barduil Month 2025. TW//CW for heavy themes of death/loss, grief, and mourning. But, hope is not entirely lost.

prompt: last winter frost/planting things

[bi-widower-dads]

Hello Friends,

It's Barduil Month (2025). My first fic of the event is here:

Will You Cleanse Me with Pleasure?

TW//CW: brief but detailed food mention; Thranduil falls but refuses to ask for help--he could have, but he didn't

Prompts: thunderstorm/rain showers

[bi-widower-dads]

Hey everyone, we hope you're having a lovely time creating for Barduil Month!

Just a quick reminder - if you've created something for the event, please remember to tag this blog @bi-widower-dads in your Tumblr posts, and add the tag #barduilmonth2025 so that we can see it and share it for everyone else! Tumblr being the functional site it is, if you don't tag us, we probably won't see it, and we really want to!

Barduil Month 2025

Hi everyone! We are well into Barduil Month and we wanted to check in and see how everyone is doing with the bingo and prompts!

Don't forget to add your fics to the event collection on AO3, and tag this blog in your posts so we can reblog them and give them a boost!

Please feel free to share your bingo cards with your progress (and tag us!)

And, to help with the 'comment on an old fic' - all you Barduil fic authors out there, how about promoting your fics? Tag us in your self-rec posts or masterlists, and we'll reblog them to give readers some fics to choose from! Readers - make a reclist of your favourite fics and...you guessed it, tag us so we can reblog!

Any questions, drop us an ask, or DM your friendly neighbourhood mods @scary-grace and @nocompromise-noregrets

[bi-widower-dads]

To Whom It May Concern,

there's a barduil discord server

[bi-widower-dads]

Thank you for including us! Barduil Month runs throughout April and we have a bingo card here and further prompts here!

Tolkien Fandom Event Calendar 2025

There are lots of exciting Tolkien fandom weeks coming up this year, so inspired by @arofili's 2023 calendar, @curiouselleth's brand new Tolkien Fandom Events community as well as @tolkienfandomevents, I decided to create a masterpost for 2025.

This list is not exhaustive, and dates are subject to change by the organisers of these events! Please check the original post for the most up-to-date version.

If you know of any events not included here, please don't hesitate to send me a message or an ask. This calendar was first posted on 13 April 2025, and only events taking place after that date will be featured. Please note that I am not running any of these events myself and that I am not responsible for any prompts/submissions part of these events.

APRIL

1-30: Barduil Month @bi-widower-dads

14-20: Silmarillion Epistolary Week @silmarillionepistolary

MAY

5-11: Angbang Week @angbangweek

11-17: Gondolin Week @gondolinweek

19-25: Glorfindel Week @glorfindelweek

26-1 June: Númenor Week @numenorweek

JUNE

26 May-1: Númenor Week @numenorweek

10-17: Tolkien Ekphrasis Week @tolkienekphrasisweek

14-20: Boromir Week @boromir-week

16-22: Tolkien South Asian Week, hosted by @arwenindomiel

16-22: Tolkien Native Language Appreciation Fest @jrrt-native-languages-fest

JULY

1-10: Samfro Summer, hosted by @frodosrings & @silme-lorien

13-19: Esoteric Tolkien Week @esotolkienweek

AUGUST

4-10: Silvergifting Week @silvergiftingweek

SEPTEMBER

1-9: Ainur Week @ainurweek

8-14: Sindar Week @sindarweek

No events scheduled for October-December 2025 so far.

Longer Events:

Tolkien Reverse Summer Bang @tolkienrsb, March-October

[bi-widower-dads]

Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda - Reedemer46 - TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms [Archive of Our Own]

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64672666

@bi-widower-dads My offering for Barduil Month 2025. Thank you to @scary-grace and @nocompromise-noregrets for giving us this lovely forum to share our combined love for these two spectacular Dads!