#elf thoughts

[hellofeanor]

Hi there! I really enjoyed your fic ‘Brittle Stars’ and was wondering if you could tells me more about what Oren’s parents and sister have been up to Valinor. It must be so horrifying to find out that your young teenage son who you thought must be dead was in fact kept alive tortured, abused, forced to have children and mind wiped into thinking he was chased from his home instead of stolen from it. At what point do you think they found out what Oren was taken for? What will it be like for Lirje (whose name i may be spelling wrong) and her descendants in Valinor to find this out?

Aw, thank you so much! This is a great question, and a topic I really need to explore in more detail, because to be honest I've only thought this through on a surface level so far.

I do think his family would have thought him dead at first, since he was taken early on in Morgoth's attempts at corrupting elves and would have been among the very first to survive the transformation. They would have known he was taken by whatever evil power lurked in the north, but assumed he had been killed. So at that point... they would have mourned the loss of their son and the others who were taken with him. But after a while, their understanding of what happened to those who disappeared would have shifted. Going by what we have in the show, Galadriel mentions stories of elves that were taken by Morgoth and twisted into orcs. And she mentions hearing these stories as a child, which means the stories existed in Valinor, which means they must have been brought over by those who undertook the great journey from Cuiviénen rather than rumours acquired later in Middle-earth.

In the story I have Óren going back to Cuiviénen a few times to capture elves, and I think that during some of these journeys, he and others like him would have been seen. One of the other moriondor could have been killed by elves, and then recognized as someone who had gone missing years earlier. And Óren recalls one of them trying to run back to the elves and then being rejected as a monster. Which may or may not have actually happened, and could be at least a partial false memory, but in this general timeframe there would have been some type of contact between the moriondor and the elves: enough contact for the elves to gain a fairly decent understanding of what actually happened to those who disappeared.

At this point, Óren's family would have started to think that it might have been better if he had died, as they originally assumed. The wounds of their grief would have opened up all over again.

I think at first, Lirjë (you did spell her name correctly!) and Óren's parents would have tried to shield her from this revelation. I imagine she would have still been fairly young when this new knowledge started to circulate, maybe close to the age Óren had been when he was taken. Her parents wouldn't want to subject her to the horror of knowing what really happened to the older brother she never knew, but of course, other people talk. She would have found out. Her family would have been well known in the village, and not in a good way, for their connection to somebody who disappeared. I don't think Óren was ever specifically seen and recognized, and Lirjë never knew with 100% certainty that her brother was one of those dark riders that came down from the north, but still she would have wondered.

I think this would have led her to not being so keen on having children of her own, if there was an ongoing danger of them being taken as Óren had been. She only married much later, and her children were born not long before setting out on the migration to Valinor.

One thing I DID think about while writing the story was whether or not all of his family would have gone to Valinor, or if some would have stayed behind out of hope that they might find him or he'd one day return. I knew for plot purposes I wanted Lirjë to have gone, but I wavered back and forth over the parents. Would they become Noldor, or Tatyarin Avari? Ultimately I decided they would want to stick close by their one remaining child. Cuiviénen no longer felt safe for any of them, and when they had the opportunity to move on to a protected land, urged on by Finwë, they would have been among the first to decide to go. Their Cuiviénen life held too many painful memories to want to stay there.

So they went to Valinor, and given that Lirjë's descendant down the line is a laundress and not a powerful noblewoman, they would have settled into quiet, unremarkable lives there. I see them living as farmers in a small settlement of elves who preferred to continue on in a lifestyle similar to what they knew in Cuiviénen.

Now... in the event that Óren decides to try to find them, what would he find? I think his family would be still living their simple life. They'd have long since given up all hope of ever seeing him again, and wouldn't even think that could ever be a possibility. Not after moving so far away, and absolutely not after the stories of Morgoth's evil in Middle-earth that would have come back with those who returned following the War of Wrath. Ayánë, being related to the royal family of Alqualondë, would have her existence and condition kept largely under wraps. Óren's family of unassuming commoners living somewhere near Tirion wouldn't be aware that any moriondor survived and had been allowed passage to Valinor. His sudden reappearance in their lives would be... a shock.

But at this point, I don't think Óren is quite ready to try to find his family. He still has centuries of negative interactions with elves to work through, and absolutely still believes that most elves would not be accepting of him and would not want to welcome him back among them. Even as recently as his interaction with Galadriel in the Southlands, those beliefs would have been reinforced. He knows elves hate the moriondor as much as he was taught to hate elves. Irrenneth's familial acceptance of him is, in his mind, a complete anomaly. He doesn't believe his parents or sister would want to see him again, knowing what he's become. And he's not really sure he would want them to see him, either.

If/when I get around to writing a sequel, this will for sure be a significant plot arc: Óren working through his trauma over interactions with elves, and deciding whether or not he's in a good enough mental place to want to seek out his family. But it's going to take a lot of work on his part. Definitely something Irenneth can help with and influence, and Pengolodh to a smaller extent, but ultimately, he'll need to make the choice on his own.

Thank you for the ask!

[elven-musings]

As of recent, I am... What is the recent "slang" for it, as the children call it? I am... Rotating it in my mind. Myself. I am rotating myself in my mind. I love myself.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Dog Meshi.

[lemongrace]

by the shore

[meo-eiru]

He did a fantasy photoshoot

(With some fake elf ears)

[3m0g1rlyyy]

Sometimes i look at my $elfharm scars and think “Damn it wasn’t even that deep”

[70-nn-13]

[moffnat]

#HE'S SO SAD???? #no listen #this man has NOBODY #his family is dead #the grove was a burden #his homeland is swallowed in shadow #he turned to alcohol in his grief #a grief so palpable that it fused itself to a weapon #he brushes off his trauma in the underdark like it's nothing #BECAUSE HONESTLY? WHEN DOES HE ACTUALLY LET HIMSELF BE VULNERABLE #PROBABLY NEVER #UNTIL NOW #'I've taken many lovers. My heart does not stir lightly.' #sounds a lot like a man using sex to cope #the same way he used alcohol i bet #grief is easily one of the top causes of addiction #and if you let him down here he says 'but i was sure we had a connection...' #case in point: halsin decides in this moment that he will be vulnerable for you #you are not just a lay to him. you are someone worth fighting his own grief for. #he wants to love and be loved no matter how scary it might be #and larian had better give me more options to show him bc i swear to god #if i have to sit here and listen to the 'i only want you, but you can be with whoever!' line one more time WITHOUT the option to tell him that he's all i want too #i will be sad forever #/endrant

[yutoxlab]

"Draw me like one of your French girls"

[hellofeanor]

Hi! its me again you friendly neighbourhood nuisance lol. So I’m super bored and my curiosity likes to torture me so i have even more questions about your fic Brittle stars. You’re absolutely entitled to ignore me if you want.

1) i dont remember if youve explained this before but what do the names lirjie, Kashan, Ayane, Gurri and Irreneth (once again a test of my spelling abilities lol) mean ?

2) how many biological kids do you thing Oren has ? It was my belief that elves have relatively slow reproduction rates with people like Feanor, Finwe etc being the exception. Is this different with uruk ?

3) how likely is it that Ayane has moved on from Oren ? This might be spoilery so you can skip this one, I’m just desperate for them get back together and have a healthy healed relationship

4) what do the parents of the original Uruks (eg. Oren Ayane all the rest) feel about the orcish grandchildren ?

5) Will Irreneth’s husband appear. Whats his feelings on everything going on?

6) Will Orens friends who he was captured with ever be reborn? If they didnt survive the transformation into Uruk does this mean they died young? Like Oren being a fully grown adult with thousands of years of misery behind him reuniting with his childhood friend, a tortured teenager.

7) will the scholars in Valinor be excited about Oren’s existence as a surving Uruk and his book(s) explaining the Uruk?

I think thats all I’ve got just now. Please don’t feel this is me pushing you to write a sequel, it’s absolutely up to you, no need to feel rushed and you’re more than welcome to ignore me. Once again love your work!

Oohoo, more good questions! Some of these I HAVE thought about and have an answer to, and some I'm just going to be pulling out of my ass. Which is which? It's a mystery. :)

Meaning of names. Okay I'm going to admit here. All of these names you listed were made up based on sound rather than meaning. I like doing it that way for two reasons, and those are 1) I'm the kind of nerd who usually knows right away what your OC's name means, which is a superpower I do not like having because it tends to kick me out of the story and into Elf Thoughts Mode (so I explicitly DO NOT want people to immediately know what my OCs names mean), and 2) I... don't really care too much what the names mean as long as they sound cool. Anyway, what I usually do for names is muck around with words until I get something I like, focusing 80% on sound and 20% on meaning. And that 20% on meaning is pretty much just making sure it doesn't mean anything horrid like "death carpet". Kashân is sort of explained in the story, though Adar himself admits he doesn't know what it means. He just liked the sound. But it's from the Valarin word akašān meaning "he says". (This does make sense in the context of the chapter I promise.) Gûri, on the other hand, is just the Gnomish word 'sweet' (basic-ass baby name right there), chosen because it also fits Black Speech phonology. Lirjë is the root verb lir (sing) with the sort of abstract noun ending -ja attached, then morphed from Lirja to Lirjë to make it a feminine name that means something like 'song'. Ayánë means something vaguely related to (but not exactly 100% spot on) 'blessed': from ayanā (to bless). And finally Irenneth is the most problematic of the bunch. Originally her name was Iranneth, but then I decided I liked the sound of Irenneth better. And DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS? 'The kinship lady': i-rend-eth. It was so stupid I had to keep it. Absolute chef's kiss of a name. Perfect.

How many biological kids does Óren have? Five that survived infancy that he knows of for sure. After that, he made a point of not keeping track of which were his, so the final count is unknown. But definitely far more than would ever be seen among elves. Tolkien mentions that elves have few children, both because children are dear to them and they want to devote sufficient time to raising each child, but also because significant physical and mental strength goes into the creation of each child. I don't think either of these limitations would be placed on the uruk. They don't put much (if any) care into raising each child, and nor do they invest anywhere near as much spiritual energy as an elf would in the child's creation, with the shortfall being made up by Morgoth's interference in the process. (At least at first with the captured elves.) As such, they're able to reproduce at a far greater rate than their elven kin.

How likely is it that Ayánë has moved on? Okay this question WOULD give massive spoilers for the patchy plot I'm slowly assembling for a sequel, so I won't say anything here. But if you do want to know just message again and I'll answer privately.

What do the parents think of the orcish grandchildren? I think they'd be horrified and try not to think about it. They learn, at some point down the line, that they're blood relatives of all these monsters that are attacking and killing their people. At early times in history, I don't think they'd be at all sympathetic, and would probably be more inclined to try to prove their distance by being some of the most vocal opponents. But maybe much later, if Óren is reunited with his parents, he can get them to come around to not just blindly hating the uruk.

Will Irenneth's husband appear? LMAO maybe? Right now he's kind of a non-character, but I did, in early (imaginary) drafts of some chapters, have scenes in which he actually appeared as more than an offhand mention. So maybe in the future he'll get a speaking role. But so far he only exists because logically Ellaer needed a dad and it would be narratively more complicated to kill him off than just keep him out of the way in the background. I don't foresee him ever being important, though.

Will Óren's friends ever be reborn? I'm going to go with... probably not. The external reason is I'm just not a huge fan of elf rebirth storylines (not against them either, but it's just not a scenario that I've ever wanted to write). The internal reason is they died in Utumno before the elves were ever found by the Valar, and would have become unhoused spirits tormented by that horrible death for years before the call of Mandos ever came into being. And would they heed that, or trust it at all? Probably not. They'd remain ghosts in the north of Palisor and eventually fade from the world entirely.

Will scholars in Valinor be excited by Óren's uruk-scholarship? LOL this is another large-scale plot spoiler for the allegedly forthcoming sequel. And also I haven't entirely decided yet. And even the aspects I think I've decided are up in the air and subject to change until written, which is a ways off yet. But this is a topic that should be addressed. Again, if you want spoilers, lmk and I'll answer privately.

Thank you again for the ask! You are making me do work and think about these questions, which is honestly good for figuring some stuff out on my end.

[elven-musings]

I fail to understand the hype around Delicious in Dungeon. Why risk your life going into an underground abyss full of monsters to feed off of them when you can quite literally stumble upon perfectly edible plants every time you venture into the depths of a forest?

I completely understand if you are jealous. I would be, as well, had I not been the one privileged to enjoy this fulfilling meal.

[snarkspawn]

this is so dumb and cheesy I'm sorry lmao happy valentine's day! 💖

[corgiteatime]

Lae'zel sees me dating both Astarion and Halsin in Act 3.

Despite having no levels in Bard, she casts Vicious Mockery by saying, "Elf dick has you acting unwise."

I am instantly killed.

Lae'zel is pleased to confirm she is the finest comedian the Githyanki ever produced.

[a-hospital--for-souls]

"Your scars will stay there forever." - Thanks Karen for enlightening me. I didn't know.

[maria-tarp]

sunburst

[fertilizing-daffodils]

Shadowheart's ears. That's it. That's the post.