#;;maedhroscanon

[eterunameo]

This has reminded me to talk more about the oath. 

Be he foe or friend, be he foul or clean Brood of Morgoth or bright Vala, Elda or Maia or Aftercomer, Man yet unborn upon Middle-earth, Neither law, nor love, nor league of swords, Dread nor danger, not Doom itself Shall defend him from Fëanáro, and Fëanáro’s kin, Whoso hideth or hoardeth, or in hand taketh, Finding keepeth or afar casteth A Silmaril. This swear we all… Death we will deal him ere Day’s ending, Woe unto world’s end! Our word hear thou, Eru Allfather! To the everlasting Darkness doom us if our deed faileth… On the holy mountain hear in witness and our vow remember, Manwë and Varda!

It strikes me that the oath was never anything to do with reclaiming the Silmarils. There was no stricture that demanded the sons of feanor had to retain a silmaril once it was wrested from a hoarder’s hands. The emphasis was only ever upon ensuring no one coveted them. No one had a right upon them or kept them away from others. It’s a very interesting oath in light of Feanor’s own hoarding of them and in fact the oath probably would have been satisfied if the Silmarils were constantly changing hands, taken from place to place and presenting in public spaces to be seen but never possessed. 

Which I think was Maedhros’ plan. The goal he had in mind was to find the silmarils, destroy Morgoth and then set up a system in which the Silmarils were owned by no one and never stayed anywhere, ever shifting their home to bathe a new city or place in their glow. That was his aim, that was the light at the end of the tunnel he saw for not just himself and his family, but for elvendom as a whole. They were to be protected and given freely about middle earth. 

But that hope was ended when Earendil took the Silmaril over the sea. Maedhros realised the Valar had gotten what they wanted and now there would be no way for him to cease this endless cycle. But just killing himself wouldn’t do, that would be a failure and would still bring down this dark doom that was far too unknowable to be safe. Happily, the oath also amusingly demands Maedhros’ own death, since he did indeed cast it afar and so had to deal his own judgement upon himself. He hopes this mitigates any terrible unknown that may have been coming otherwise. 

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Maedhros has a legal PHD. Maedhros was a Politician. Maedhros presided over and engaged in committees and headed many distinct changes in the way Tirion as a country was run. Most for the better.

A very vital part of Maedhros’ characterisation is that he was not only schooled in diplomacy and politics, he worked his way up to becoming what I essentially consider something along the lines of a Supreme Court Judge in Tirion-upon-Tuna, only with a more political slant. Maedhros isn’t just a man with height and charisma, Maedhros is incredibly comfortable reading, writing, dictating and pulling apart legal jargon and debating points and running campaigns and getting people to work together. 

He has been the respectable front for the Feanorian family his whole life and, luckily, found he was not only good at that but also had a passion for it. The satisfaction he gets in completing projects and taking up causes is immense and he was known as a truly formidable force to contend with. Colleagues would dread going up against him on the house floor. And yet he also managed to maintain an absolutely ironclad image of respectability. Maedhros never shouts, insults without purpose or engages in squabbles outside of the proceedings. 

So he had offices within Tirion and in fact spent a good chunk of his time there, even after his family exited their personal dwellings to Formenos, he still kept his rooms and his job. Hence he and Fingolfin were actually quite amiable with each other and Maedhros probably knew his Uncle better than his father knew his brother. All in all this relationship of respect allowed both Maedhros to be very content in his decision to cede the crown, and gave Fingolfin the confidence that it wasn’t some kind of ploy or trick. 

[eterunameo]

This is very cliche of me but Maedhros’ relationship to pain is just completely different from the norm after he returns from Angband. It’s not really correct to say that he has excellent pain tolerance, because that would be assuming that he has to endure pain, that it effects him in the same way it effects others. Honestly speaking, Maedhros doesn’t experience pain anymore in a way we would recognise, he registers sensations but their impact is complex and more akin to the sensation of watching a very sad film. It’s sad and sometimes difficult to watch, but you’re still watching it because that feeling is compelling to have. 

This was one of the few things he did not already have coping mechanisms for by the time he left Angband, since he had no experience on how it might effect him on the outside. Hence there’s a period of learning where he must understand how he experiences pain now and, particularly in battle, make sure to recognise it now that it has no instinctual urgency to it. 

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Would Maedhros have eliminated the sons of Elwing, if Maglor had not took pity on them?

Ask me HC questions: Always accepting!

This, at least, I can say definitively. No absolutely not. 

This is not necessarily out of any particular warmth or mercy Maedhros felt for others at this time, but he was in fact still putting quite a lot of thought into his engagements and how to satisfy the oath. Namely, he endeavoured to never do anything other than what was necessary to the tennants of the oath. 

Whoso hideth or hoardeth, or in hand taketh,Finding keepeth or afar castethA Silmaril. This swear we all…Death we will deal him ere Day’s ending. 

So. As the oath directs, Maedhros’ mode of operation was very clear. Establish if someone was intending on keeping a silmaril from them (asking for the Silmaril) and then killing them if they were. Any action taken outside of these strictures had the risk of further increasing the harm Maedhros would be forced to do further down the road. So, since Elrond and Elros never handled the silmaril in a way that would transgress on the oath, they had nothing to do with him and should have been allowed to continue as such. 

This was the major reason why he did not wish for Maglor to keep the twins. By including them in their lives there was every possibility that either twin would somehow be caught up in the oath and at this point Maedhros’ caution and keen focus on the kind of butterfly effect web he was caught in was very high. Indeed, he fears that the deaths of Elured and Elurin might have been the catalyst that made Elwing refuse his request for the silmaril herself. 

So no! He would never have harmed Elrond and Elros, no matter what Maglor had done.

[eterunameo]

Maedhros and his Torture

Have a migraine today and decided this is a perfect time to get this hc down. So lets start off with a point of clarification: I am not applying to the fandom idea of Maedhros’ torture having anything along the lines of sexual abuse. I can see the logic and perhaps there would be interesting stuff to discuss with it, but the overall weird obsession that I’ve seen in the fandom with Maedhros being raped just makes me wildly uncomfortable and I’m not going to engage in it. There’s also parts of me that just thinks it’s somewhat lazy anyway. 

Moving on! Maedhros’ torture was still horrendously and shudderingly invasive. Morgoth and Sauron have just enough command over fea and the ways of elven existence to use insidious means to dig their fingers into his being and torment him by warping his own internal realities in ways that never stop effecting him. Physical torture was a means to the end of the spiritual torture that was their goal. With his hroa weakened his fea was more vulnerable to be pulled and shaped and torn at, held suspended away from his body, bruising the connection between them, less able to reject the versions of reality forced upon it. 

Being hung off Thangorodrim wasn’t just another form of torture, it was very specific. A way for Maedhros to somewhat recover from the disassociation he suffered, so that he didn’t slip away too far, yet also never allowing him any grounding stimulus other than pain. In this way, gradually (for Maedhros resisted it) the relationship between Maedhros’ flame and his body (and so his relationship to physical existence) was made to be associated with pain and suffering only, only to be assured and comforted that he existed by being in pain. There is a fear he cannot find words for, after being rescued, that he is existing wrongly, as though there are more than one versions of himself, all slightly tilted, angled wrong about him, he can’t gather himself into a whole creature. 

This leaves him with myriad issues, but the most definable ones are: He can no longer engage in osanwe, it is simply out of his reach. He suffers fits if he is left without stimulation for too long or is somehow suspended, like being picked up or if he is in a lukewarm bath. He can only sleep with a leather strip belted around his arm that has metal studs to dig into his skin and keep a consistent low level pain there, or any other method of maintaining that. He has to work through sudden and irrationally burning fury anytime someone’s eyes meet his in a specific way. This he puts particular effort into recovering from, but he still demands his soldiers do not look into his eyes until they are given permission to do so. Eye motifs, in general, he simply will not be in the presence of. 

He also struggles with connecting to others after this, an element of him associating such deep bonds as he had with his brothers and his friends with the forced mental intimacy Morgoth and Sauron inflicted. This, he also finds ways to manage, though it works differently with every person and some (like Maglor) want to help so badly that their pushing can only create more distance. 

All of these things, though deeply effecting to Maedhros’ life, are very easy to hide. Which he does, religiously. Not only that, whilst some of them are new to him when he returns to Hithlum, most of them are issues he’s been managing for many years now. He’s had 30 years of time to recognise the changes in himself and find coping mechanisms for them. And so the perception of most is that Maedhros came home after thirty years, took a week or two of bed rest for his arm stump to stop bleeding, then just stood up and continued on like nothing had happened. 

The fact that he was more severe, less emotive and more prone to snapping just seems... small in comparison, and is generally ignored. A lot of the sympathy Maedhros garners is towards his lost hand but in truth Maedhros found that the easiest part of it all to come to terms with. The phantom pain of it was helpful, if anything, and the fact that there were active solutions that he could confidently work towards (like learning to use a sword in his left hand) were a blessing compared to the confusion and loss he felt towards everything else. 

[eterunameo]

‘and Maidros tall, the eldest, whose ardour yet more eager burnt than his father’s flame, than Feanor’s wrath; him fate awaited with fell purpose.’

This is possibly my favourite quote about Maedhros and definitely the best summation of him and his life and manners. He’s this wonderful and poignantly tragic contradiction, his unbridled passion giving drive that not even his father’s wrath could match, eager to act and change and make choices. And yet? Where did all this go? In the end he made one choice and fate decided that no matter how brightly he burned it wouldn’t matter to his tale, it would not change the ending. Fate knew exactly what it wanted from Maitimo and it would use him cruelly to it’s own ends. 

And yet Maedhros did change so much. There was still so much power inherent in his ardour for people and endeavours and working together. He never needed the crown to do the things he wanted to do, he already had absolute confidence in his own internal and personal power to do what he wanted. And though that faith turns very bitter and aching later, it still endures right until the end. When his decision to die is, also, centred around his passion for the people of the world and his wish to just put an end to this. To not be used any longer. OH he’s so proud, OH he’s so self-assured but it’s easy to forgive when he is proudest of his skills at cooperation and has the aptitude to back up his confidence. 

[eterunameo]

Maedhros the Nurturer

It is well accepted by all finweans that Maedhros takes after his mother most. This is an over simplification, to be sure, and discounts the parts of Feanor that Maedhros made conscious efforts not to emulate, but it serves for the purposes of loosely describing him. And certainly is an easy way to explain how well Maedhros manages in the ‘eldest brother’ role. 

As a person with a great deal of self control and endurance, it did seem that Maedhros was somewhat built to be the eldest brother to six vibrant and unwieldy personalities. With each new addition to their family, Maedhros took care to know them well and has always felt a great deal of protectiveness and tenderness towards his brothers. Maglor was possibly the only brother he ever felt any amount of jealousy for, since he was the only one to really compete with their parents attention whilst Maedhros was a young child. And indeed, for his younger brothers the line between eldest brother and parental figure is blurred. 

But, in truth, Maedhros’ family is very vital to him. It is not an altruistic act to care for them, defend them and sacrifice for them politically and physically as he does. He is an incredibly difficult person to know and an even harder person to befriend. His family and brothers understand him and treat him in very unique ways that he finds painful to miss. 

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Maedhros and Sarati

Strangely enough one of the main gripes Maedhros and his father ever had with each other was surrounding Tengwar. After learning Sarati and then using it in notations and citations and legal documents and every other part of his very writing-heavy occupation, Maedhros found the idea of learning a whole new script very tedious, even if he agreed wholeheartedly that Tengwar was superior in it’s ease and simplicity. He did learn it, for that reason, but still writes a good majority of his notes in Sarati which makes for some very confusing reading, what with everything going up and down and right to left all over the place. Feanor is positively disgusted everytime he gets a letter from his son and Nerdanel is forced to read it herself and then tell him what his eldest said later.

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Maedhros the Mean

Maedhros doesn’t necessarily have a desire to be a good man or be considered good by others around him. It’s a far more inherent quality in him that says he must act with honour and sacrifice for justice and work for the betterment of all. It’s just in his nature. He would not be himself if he did not. It would also be hypocritical of him not to uphold the tenants of the justice system he enacts.

And with this in mind the things the oath drives him towards are enough to gut a man. It means so little to be a diplomat when you will not be met and your simple requests are considered selfish and greedy. It is agonising to watch people seal their own fate, like a storm rumbling on a horizon but watching as the people in it’s path do not flee their homes. The mixture of fury at them and disgust at yourself and all else that comes with it- the sense of losing who you are cannot be denied. 

And so Maedhros does quash his empathy for others over time, better to make the decisions he needed to make with the Oath in mind. He was no longer working towards the goals he had always held and therefore he needed to change to suit it. So he is not necessarily cruel, but he is apparently less caring or thoughtful of others about him, becoming somewhat solipsistic. Elrond and Elros would have known a man who never laughed, nor initially put thought into their needs or feelings, leaving Maglor to his doomed to failure project. Still, even after it all, there are some things that cannot be so thoroughly quashed and eventually some caring shows through for the boys. 

[eterunameo]

Maedhros and his tempered fire.

Through a lot of careful and nearly forensic observation of his parents and particularly his father, Maedhros realised that cowing to the demands of his riotous passions and flames would not produce the kinds of effects he desired in people. He had no interest in being out of control or considered difficult to manage, indeed the idea of people seeing him as needing management repulsed him. 

Hence Maedhros naturally developed an incredibly ponderous, aloof and neutral manner. Actions, words and even expressions are always very well thought out, especially in unfamiliar situations. He doesn’t admit struggle or hurt or issue, that would be against his purpose, and nor does he press his ardour into anything but action. One can tell Maedhros is passionate about something because of how well he does it, not by the things he says, unless you make an effort to ask him about it. 

This creates a very shocking dichotomy between him at rest and him in battle. He is a collossus but slow predator, most of the time, movements sweeping and slow, gaze heavy with it’s intensity but not snapping. He laughs from his chest, a round brassy note. But in battle suddenly he is barely visible. His speed and accuracy with a sword is legendary, that he is the best swordsman among all Quendi is never in any doubt. He lances across the battlefield like lightning in the only visible expression of the roiling inner storms of his soul.