#so I leap from the gallows and the rope breaks it can’t break me

[spell-cleaver]

DAY 14: WHUMPTOBER: Is Something Burning? @whumptober2020​

Again, this is set in The Pirate Son ‘verse! This is how Luke escaped being hanged.

His father wasn’t going to help him. The queue for the gallows snaked forward and forward, until Luke stood in front of the platform and there were hands under his shoulders, hauling him up. He shivered as the cold wind blew through his hair, but lifted his chin, stoic, as the hangman shoved him none-too-gently onto the trap door. The cuffs which suppressed Luke’s magic were stiff against his wrist, making him feel even heavier. Every footstep thumped like a battle drum. A death knell.

The hangman leaned down to whisper in his ear. “I can’t wait to see you get what you deserve, pirate.”

Luke said nothing. He kept staring out at the crowd—he had a better view from up here. The Emperor’s box was directly front of him, draped in red silks, with his father standing at the Emperor’s right side. Palpatine was watching him closely, goading him—he was mouthing something at Luke, but Luke refused to look—and Vader, under his eternal mask, looked impassive. There was nothing to see there, so Luke did not view him for very long.

Instead, he just set his jaw, and stared at the fluttering edge of that red silk. Embroidered in gold and black, it was fraying, damp from the rain and mud that permeated the rest of the square.

He kept his eyes fixed where that scrap of fabric had been in his vision even when the hangman eclipsed it, dragging the coarse rope of the noose around his neck. His breath was hot against his ear.

“My brother was a great sailor. A loyal man. When he was assigned a ship on Tarkin’s pride ship, the Death Star, it was the family’s honour.” Luke did close his eyes before this man could spit in them. “Until some nobody pirate sank it and sent him to the bottom of the sea.”

“You wish I was a nobody pirate,” Luke whispered back. “You wish that all of us were nobodies, or and you think that your precious sailors are any better than we are. They’re not. We’re not. And if breaking unjust Imperial laws that perpetuate oppression, sadism and death makes me a villain, or a scoundrel… I am happy to be one.”

The wounds up his back, his face, from the keelhauling still stung. They stung like crazy. And when that hangman backhanded him so hard he saw stars, they hurt even more.

“I hope your death is agonising. It seems to be. And I know you will suffer thereafter.”

Luke spat at his feet. “All the suffering this life directs at people like me, I’d hope that I wouldn’t.”

He cringed back when he heard movement, bracing himself for another hit, but the hangman just grunted. There—there was a moment where he pulled on the rope, and Luke cried out as it constricted his throat momentarily, tightly, for three long seconds—

Then the guy loosened it again and walked over to the lever, probably smiling to himself.

It occurred to Luke that it probably wasn’t wise to antagonise the man who held his life in his hands, but he was going to snuff it out anyway. Might as well enjoy antagonising him while he could.

His gaze found that scrap of fabric again, blowing in the wind. His vision was still blurry from the hit—or were those tears? He didn’t want to die, after all, much less at his father’s order—so when at first he saw the smoke, he thought he was imagining it. The first shadow he would see, among many.

Then he blinked, while the hangman began to read his charges.

“Luke Skywalker, pirate, self-styled ‘privateer’ who served aboard wanted ships the Falcon and the Rogue, is sentenced, for dozens of counts of murder, piracy, theft, sabotage—”

Was… was that…?

“—damage of Imperial naval and civilian property, collusion with Rebels, treason—”

Smoke?

His mouth dropped open when he saw it; the gesture was uncomfortable, against the rope digging into his neck.

There was a fire burning.

There was a fire burning under the Emperor’s box.

Someone had set fire to the silks.

“—resisting arrest, and most notably, the destruction of Governor Tarkin’s naval vessel the Death Star and the wanton slaughter of all personnel on board—”

Palpatine had no idea. Palpatine was staring at Luke, as Luke saw when he finally deigned to look at him, with a sadistic glee on his face, a faint smile. Luke smiled back, allowing his bitterness to shine through—and none of his hope.

His gaze flicked to his father, at Palpatine’s right. Did he notice the smoke, the flames eating the box away as the hangman drivelled? Surely he must. Surely—

But Vader did not flinch.

He kept staring at Luke.

“—for these crimes, and many others not listed, in the name of His Majesty the Emperor Palpatine and the glorious Empire he protects, Skywalker is to hang by the neck until dead—”

A shadow flickered. Luke raised his gaze further, to see a silhouette atop a nearby house around the square, the sun on their shoulder, raising a bow.

Aimed right at him.

Kill me, he mouthed. Kill me quickly.

“—and,” the hangman finished, “may God have mercy on his rotten soul.”

He lowered the scroll of paper, his heavy black clothes moving around him in a way that was uncomfortably similar to Luke’s father’s as he stepped up to the lever. Luke didn’t let himself look away as he put his hand on it, ready to pull.

“Does the condemned have any last words to express?” Palpatine called out suddenly, the rest of the square awed into silence by his voice. “Anything he would like to say. I am not a man without mercy, if he repents.”

The hangman paused, clearly resentful that Luke might not be killed after all, but he paused to look at Luke.

Luke looked levelly at Palpatine, and pointedly did not look at the fire underneath him.

“I hope you burn,” he said.

Palpatine’s lips twisted. “Do it.”

And then several things happened at once.

Out of the corner of his eye, Luke saw movement, and instinctually flinched, expecting the yank on his neck any time soon, expecting—

He was not expecting—

The archer on the rooftop fired. The arrowhead was broad, and sharp—and scythed right through the rope. Luke gasped as he felt it thump against his back.

That—

How—

He didn’t stop to think. He didn’t stop to breathe—he just reached up, with his hands that were bound together in front of him, and seized the noose, yanking on it until it loosened, tearing it off his neck and stumbling toward the edge of the platform.

“Hey—!" the hangman shouted—but not at him. There was another thunk, and a spray of blood, and the hangman went down.

His knife was on his belt.

Luke’s eyes alighted on it, and he scrambled for it, hurrying, ignoring the way a hailstorm of arrows was descending from the rooftops, picking off assailants climbing onto the gallows one by one, crawling toward the hangman’s corpse awkwardly to where the blade reflected  the steel grey sky…

He smelt burning before he heard the crackling.

When he looked up, he expected to be the recipient of a furious glare on Palpatine’s part. Nor did he expect his father to be please, either. But when he glanced up, Palpatine—of course—had bigger issues to worry about.

The stand was on fire.

He was surrounded by flames.

The red guards were shouting, grabbing for His Insincere Majesty, trying to get him out soon—and Luke laughed when he turned his head and closed his hand around the hilt of the knife. He sawed at his bonds, quickly, not wasting any time, even as the smoke rose and the crackling got louder—the surroundings got hotter.

Leia was here! It had to be her; there was no one else he knew who was so deadly in aim, so brilliant, good enough to plan this out. And Wedge—Wedge, whose alarming pyromaniac tendencies they’d had to aggressively curb on a ship at sea, it must have been him who suggested the fire, and Han who had the sheer balls to pull it off—

These were his friends, they were coming for him—

The ropes gave. He gave a sigh of relief, then—then had a thought. Jabbed the tip of the knife into the lock on the shackles that bound his magic, twisted it, wriggled it…

It fell loose.

He crowed as his magic flooded back into him. Whipped his head up and glanced around—and when one of the city guard came for him, sword out and face contorted in hatred, Luke shot him back with a strong spell to the gut.

Then he got to his feet.

Every part of him hurt. His back and face roared with his keelhauling injuries. His neck smarted, sore, where the guy had tightened the noose. His old, old wounds, from his capture, were still scrapes over his torso. His existence, as it had always been, was pain.

But his magic thrummed through him and all was well.

The fire was spreading. The crowd ran, screaming, and torn scraps of crimson silk danced in the wind, flickering about them, burning to embers and dust among the carnage. The Emperor’s beautiful box burnt, and before Luke’s very eyes, the fire jumped from wooden stand to wooden stand, until it gnawed at the very gallows he was standing on. He made to jump, to leave, to escape, to find his friends and get out of here and return to the sea where he belonged—

But he glanced at the Emperor’s box for one moment too long.

It was a monument to destruction, all orange and black. All he could see were silhouettes—but he knew those silhouettes.

Vader was pointing a sword at Palpatine.

Luke stared.

Vader was pointing a sword at Palpatine.

His father opened his mouth to roar words Luke could not make out, and then sparks bluer than the fire itself erupted between the lords, obscuring Luke’s view, and—

Luke had delayed too long.

The fire was on the gallows, the deadweight noose shrivelling to a husk, the soles of his boots heating up. Smoke clogged his lungs.

“Jump, Luke!” a voice shouted, floating on the ashy air.

Luke took a running leap, and jumped.

The crowd was a thick knot of people, pushing and pulling in every which way, their terror evident in their screams. But one knot was put together, they knew what they were doing, hidden behind the helmets of Vader’s 501st soldiers—Luke’s friends were geniuses, that was the perfect way to smuggle themselves in—and when he jumped, they raised their hands to catch him. They grunted when he landed, letting him down harshly—his back twinged—but gently enough that no injury was done. One of them placed a hand on his shoulder.

A very tight hand.

“We have him,” an unfamiliar—no, not unfamiliar, no—voice said. “Tell Lord Vader we have him.”

“Lord Vader has left the Emperor’s box; he’ll meet us at the Lady,” another voice came, and then Luke was being hauled up, multiple hands clasped onto his arms, and—

“What!?” he asked, trying to shake them off. “What—what are you—”

“You’re coming with us, Skywalker.”

“What!? No!” Luke stopped. Kicked, struggled—screamed.

When they just shifted their grips on him so he couldn’t fight as easily, he cried out from pain of it.

“Where are my friends?” he demanded. “What are you—”

“Your friends aren’t here, Skywalker. Vader rescued you.” Luke’s jaw fell open. “And if you want to survive, if you want to escape being hanged, you are going to walk with us.”

Luke did not walk with them. And he did not make it easy for them to drag him.

Even undead soldiers disliked it when their fingers got ripped off.

[kendrixtermina]

Assorted House of Feanor Thoughts

I wrote this as a reply to someone, but then realized that this should be a post of its own. 

Line between extrapolation, interpretation & headcanon is going to be fluid here

Long post under cut

The seven sons in general:

all moody, fierce, intense and brilliant, each in various different ways

none of them can really stand to be cooped up in one place for long

F R E C K L E S you will not convince me otherwise

Apart from the ones explicitly described as pretty (ie, Maedhros and Celegorm) they’re actually relatively plain by elf standards, or at least sort of rugged-looking, especially compared to their part-Vanyar cousins - I mean, figures that some would turn out more like Miriel or Nerdanel both of which were supposedly more average.

all are very resourceful having spent most of their lives helping out with their parent’s projects, exploring the wilderness, or (save for Celegorm) hanging out in Aule’s halls. Most can probably whip up a steampunk or magitech solution to basic war-related problems

Because of this they’re a very tight-knit group

growing up, they did not know many children their age; Ironically the most contact they had was with their cousins because Feanor paid semi-regular visits to Finwe. Apart from Turgon (and Orodreth if you place him in the second rather than the third post-journey generation) the cousins really dug the adventure stories. (Galadriel pretended not to be interested and offered plenty of critiques, but listened anyways)

more survival skills and just a lot more casual than your average princes

They’d all been adults for a good while by the time of the rebellion; the twins are a tad older than Aredhel, Galadriel and Argon; Caranthir and Angrod are about the same age. Curufin is younger than Aegnor.

They all look back at that trip to the lightless shore of the outer sea as a cherished family memory

Also I don’t think Feanor disciplined his sons very much after all his own father let him get away with everything. In his eyes the brats can do no wrong especially not Curufin and to a lesser extent Amrod Nerdanel tried her best to counterbalance this and it kind of worked on some of them, but the three middle ones were a lost cause

I think a lot of the weight behind the oath comes from how Feanor made them promise him to see it through on his deathbed. It was his literal last wish.

Maedhros:

The Leader™, the most strong-willed and the deadliest fighter by a huge margin. What the orc under your bed has nightmares about.

Obviously a very competent diplomat, strategist, and the sort to put constructive results over personal glory; resilient, formidable, unpretentious and tough as leather

but not at all overconfident, and the type who is not blind to the flaws of the people he loves. He knows very well that Feanor wasn’t perfect and does many things that his father would not have agreed with - at the same time he has a strong sense of obligation, honor and loyalty which turns out to be his fatal flaw in the end when being loyal and keeping his word  increasingly requires him to do dishonorable things

if there was a definite breaking point it was the fiasco with Dior’s sons

Stoic but courteous and eloquent; From Finwe’s death onwards increasingly grim, grizzled and not very hopeful, though he’s the sort to give his all and try to be noble even when there’s no reward or even thanks or respect.

Despite this, he has as a dry sense of humor and at times uses it to defuse tense situations or disarm people he’s negotiating with (see the scene with Thingol’s message) - does have a streak of gallows humor to him especially after the Thangorodrim incident

As the heir Feanor actually let him in on trade secrets and scientific speculation; Their relationship is probably the most equal; I do think Feanor was capable of actually appreciating that Maedhros got a mind of his own and isn’t afraid to stand up for himself. Feanor values independent thought, even if he’s not always good at really living that value with his tendency to take things personally and see others as taking sides for or against him.  

Can’t really craft stuff to the same degree without his right hand. He then focussed on more abstract/mental pursuits which were perhaps his forte, to begin with but it still bothers him more than he lets on, especially since he still retains, or swiftly regained, his skill at making things dead. 

He may or may not qualify as a cinnamon roll but he definitely looks like could kill you

Maglor:

Maedhros might have been the token responsible sibling, but Maglor was the understanding, comforting one and always had a nurturing streak - hence why he was the one to take in the kids.

Sensitive Artistic Type™ - goes from quirky and passionate back in Valinor to melancholy & tormented as the war drags on

one of those people who despair over & get self-critical over their work even when it’s regarded as masterpieces

Like Feanor and Miriel before him, he tends to get super absorbed in his work/art and just plain disappears for days

Now some ppl hold that he didn’t start having second thoughts until near the end, but judging from how he comes along to Fingolfin’s party or to hang out with Finrod, I’d hold that he was always ‘the nice/gentle one’, but not solely in a positive way; Unlike Maedhros he did not stand up to Feanor about the thing with the ships and indeed lets Maedhros talk him out of turning himself in at the very end, so he’s probably somewhat lacking in assertiveness

Even so, he’s probably one of the better fighters, given the difficult territory he gets, that he’s the one to kill Ulfang, and how long he survives. He probably feels ambivalent about this. 

I imagine him having an agility-based fighting style

Probably codified the heroic epos as a specifically Noldorin art form

Celegorm:

A lot of ppl focus on the barbarian aspect, but I’d say he actually has some degree of ‘subverted prince charming’ going on, with how he sweet-talks Luthien at first before throwing her in the dungeon, and how he seems to have been one of the more accomplished ones, joining a respected order and all

He’s actually pretty elegant and perhaps playfully gallant, but it’s a facade; He’s an animal underneath; though his instincts are probably somewhat nobler than what ends up happening when he gets roped into Curufin’s schemes

usually, the first to react and leap into action when something happens.

Herculean strength, daunting presence

also a fairly efficient general, if a bit of a glory hound and pretty fearless in the pursuit of victory

very much has an ego and doesn’t like being humbled at all

Strikes me as the sort of person who would take badly to the realization that they can no longer return to the glory of the past or being judged unworthy, not that he’d respond with anything but defiance

Wrestles giant monsters barehanded

Always low-key wished to fight creatures of darkness before the rebellion to test his might against them; Orome and the Maiar members of the hunt would have told stories of them

though he gets his pretty face from Daddy, his strong build comes from Nerdanel, possibly somewhat accentuated by his being a dude

Caranthir:

grumpy, moody, no filter, likes his alone time, shows his feelings mostly through actions, also somewhat pragmatic

the quartermaster; Actually one of the smarter ones, if not outright the second smartest after Curufin, though he has more a logistic/administrative sort of intelligence

generally one of the more prosaic, practical family members, or maybe he’s just more subtle about his dramatic side or has a harder time expressing it. Definitely has Hidden Dephts™

I mean, putting your hideout on the slope of a mountain near a deep, dark lake circled by mountains? Goth AF. A+ aesthetic there.

Hosts the family get-togethers at his fortress. Has most certainly shoved Celegorm and Curufin in the lake at some point

has a certain respect for strength, valor and skill even in ppl he doesn’t necessarily like; Not at all diplomatic or polite, but also not finicky or fastidious, so actually forged a whole lot of alliances on a “everyone’s money/swords are equally good and we don’t have to set conditions” basis and seems to have been pretty successful at this

started out haughty but definitely learned to be more open-minded/ broaden his horizon over his time in Beleriand - but as no good deed goes unpunished, Ulfang happens

Whereas Curufin and Celegorm can put up a noble veneer but will totally stab you in the back if provoked, Caranthir’s sort of the opposite, in that he’s rude and quarrelsome on first contact but has a good heart deep down (see the Haladin incident) and doesn’t keep grudges long term once he’s done grumbling where Celegorm is sore loser and Curufin a spiteful twerp.

though personally, I don’t see Caranthir as trying to reign himself in. He wouldn’t really be known as “the harshest” in that case. Who was gonna teach him to behave himself, Feanor maybe? kek. 

Curufin:

We have a lot of actual dialogue & description for him - he has this characteristic little defiant smile, is often coldly contemptuous in tone, some level of ruthless pragmatism

has mild/vague foresight - nothing as impressive as what Finrod and Galadriel have, but he has it more or less to the degree that Feanor did.

actually pretty insightful, thought-through and political-minded in some ways, too bad he shares Feanor’s tendency for unwarranted suspicion and factionalism, as well as a tendency to just act on his own without checking with anyone

always either filthy from work or fully blinged-out and impeccably groomed, no in-between

more calculated and subtle than Feanor - not that Feanor ever needed calculation or subtlety since he could get by on sheer awe or intimidation. Celegorm and Maedhros have that same quality in spades and Curufin’s a little bit jealous

Not actually that much older than the twins, but always acted older than his age, especially once he heard that Feanor was the same

collects weapons, loves fancy horses, the most traditionally aristocratic of the seven

Got married relatively young; saw it as a matter of honor to further his family’s line

continued his scholarly pursuits in Beleriand; this is part of why he elected to share a territory with Celegorm

The last Celebrimbor ever heard of him was a magically sealed box filled with research notes he sent out in case he didn’t make it out alive

Did not take his parents’ estrangement well and is stubbornly salty toward Nerdanel (though deep down he misses her as much as his brothers if not more)

Frequently the Bad Influence/ Shoulder Devil to his brothers.

But when he gets excited about his research/craft he’s got this “exited cocky little boy” side to him that’s surprisingly pure. 

Only Nerdanel and possibly Celebrimbor’s mom are allowed to call him ‘Atarinke.’ His brothers might still use it when they’re teasing or scolding him. 

The Twins:

Every time a fic does something else with them than “generic prankster redheads” I cry with joy

We don’t have that many data points on them, but most of them suggest they’re every bit as fierce as their brothers

they’re somewhat aloof & mostly do their own thing;

As kids they’d mostly sit in a corner and play with each other. Possibly deliberately played up their identicalness as a kind of emo fashion statement / to fuck with people (”Should we do this Ambarussa?” - ”I don’t know, what do you think, Ambarussa?”)

never really gave up their semi-nomadic ways

Compared to Celegorm they probably more on stealth and precision than strength and bravado. They suddenly appear in front of you, and bam! You’ve got an arrow poking out of your face. Probably the ones scouting the perimeter of the camp.

Amras is a bit sassier, but it’s actually Amrod who’s a little bit braver.

Hardly ever argued until their parents’ estrangement; That led to quite a few quarrels between them.

For all his faults, Feanor made a point of doing things with each of them individually.

quietly nursing some level of pent-up despair and frustration until they push for the assault on Sirion

In the version where one of them dies, and then no one ever talks about it, - I imagine that the remaining one ended up cynical in a “let’s just get it ever with we’re already doomed after all’ kind of way

Bonus:

Celebrimbor

“Curiosity killed the cat but the second mouse gets the cheese” incarnate. He’s a sweet, excitable,  deeply good guy, but Curiosity is the strongest force within him, besides maybe “think of the potential”

very bold in his thinking, not held back by any conventional boundaries. This is partially why he ended up more independent than his father and uncles but ironically that might in a sense make him more similar to grandpa than any of them

Really looks like Feanor. Like, Arwen and Luthien level of resemblance. It takes ppl a bit to notice because of how different his general demeanor and surface-level personality is. 

Very scattered and absent-minded, prone to sudden flashes of inspiration, often shows up in some form of disarray

spent his adolescence at Formenos. Retained a certain affinity for wintery places ever since

He sensed something fishy about Sauron before long, but between wanting to avoid the family propensity for unwarranted suspicion and being tempted by all the possibilities of what he could do with that power/knowledge even if it did come from a fishy source, he didn’t act before it was too late - he can't have been fully clueless since he hid the three; There was definitely just a bit of actual seduction/forbidden fruit appeal in place there, whether to use the word “hubris” probably depends on your philosophy. 

He drops the ‘th’ once he renounces Curufin, but slips right back into the old habit when excited or exasperating. At some point during his rule of Eregion, he stops bothering to hide it - A similar thing happens when he’s talking Sindarin with his northeast Beleriand accent. 

I know this is a very popular old hat headcanon, but... His other name is also “Curufinwe”. Everyone called him Telperinquar from the start, lest all three come running and grumble about being distracted from work, but after the Nargothrond debacle, he had other reasons for not using it. But really, Telperinquar/Celebrimbor is just another more metaphorical way to say “this baby shall be good at working with his hands” so yeah

My HC for where he was between the Finrod incident and the second age is as follows: He departed for war with Gwindor’s troupe (this is someone who tried to engineer a way around entropy - not a “do nothing” sort of guy) and fled the battlefield with Turgon. (hence some of the passages that place him in Gondolin can still be made to work. He totally made Earendil’s baby-sized mail coat) He fled with Idril’s party. Had she not tipped him off somehow he would probably have died with the rest of the smith’s guild. Or perhaps he grabbed all the valuable records he could find and ran for it because someone needed to preserve them. As living surrounded by the survivors of Doriath would have been awkward to say the least, he went to the isle of Balar to offer his skills and service to Gil-Galad. This is where he befriended/ reconnected with Galadriel and Celeborn. 

Finrod once told him the “faithful stone” legend from Brethil. It would be an inspiration to him much later. Generally credits Finrod with being a good influence on him. 

Judging by the stars on the doors of Durin his stance on his family probably softened over the years. He essentially attained their original new dream of exploring distant lands and building unparalleled new realms, at least for a while - also definitely has a similar “screw destiny!”/ “I defy you stars!” attitude. Perhaps he wanted to see their vision done right. 

But on some level, I think he also wanted to associate himself with their fame eventually especially once his own accomplishments grew. His feelings were probably always very ambiguous because he must have admired and envied their great works but also lived getting weird looks whenever he did what he’s best at and loves doing most in the world because it associates him with these very ambiguous people whom many hated... at one point in the past he must have really admired his father and grandfather, I mean, he came with them across the sea. 

Nerdanel

She got Feanor the apprenticeship / gave him the idea after they met on their travels. 

Were seen as something of an eccentric hippie/ hipster couple in the early days

She’s tough, confident and definitely quipped/ yelled back at times. Definitely described as ‘strong-willed’ and individual. Like this was a ‘kindred spirits’ thing before everything went to hell

it counts for something that even during the ugly bitter parting scene the worst Feanor could say was “someone must’ve turned you against me because you definitely cared once” rather than “you’re a traitor” for all that everything else in that scene made him very punchable

Their relationship dynamic, as I see it, is that she’s the one person who just sees and treats him like a normal dude. No apprehension, no fawning. He’s not “the greatest” or a tainted aberration to her, he’s simply a like-minded friend. So she’s pretty chill about his idiosyncrasies and doesn’t see them as a big deal, but on the other hand, she’s not overawed and will not take bullshit

Since she is good at understanding people she probably usually gets where he’s coming from even when he’s not being reasonable

possibly invented abstract art; was most certainly influential. 

the elves who serve Aule probably have their own little traditions. She might’ve imparted some of those on her descendants

Also ppl tend to forget that she also does metalwork. Again, it’s quite possible that she got him into it and that if they’d never met, he might have landed in a completely different discipline

I think it says a lot about Feanor that he chose her for being smart, creative and independent-minded. It shows that he actually values these things and that it’s not just a rhetorical device;  he’s not a hypocrite, he failed at what he was genuinely trying to aim for. 

She had Finwe won over the moment she mentioned that she likes children. To Feanor’s chagrin, she proclaimed that his then-tiny half-siblings were the cutest thing ever but since he was trying to impress Nerdanel, he actually kept his composure there. 

She was totally buds with Earwen and Anaire. 

I really like those fics where she played some part in the reconstruction efforts. She’s already renowned for her wisdom and has some familiarity with the court, so why wouldn’t Finarfin make her an advisor? 

Miriel

She was described as having “silver” hair like what the teleri sometimes have, but that was for lack of a better world. It’s actually pretty close to pure white. It was an unprecedented anomaly. Celegorm got it. Though overall Maglor might be the one who most looks like her. Or maybe Caranthir. 

Well, her tendency to refuse to eat her words no matter what has certainly proven highly heritable

Canonically one of those ppl who talks very fast 

Feanor doesn’t look very much like her at all, but he talks like her and is similar in his body language etc. The shape of her hands, however, has made it all the way to Celebrimbor in an unbroken line. Maglor’s got em too. 

She was the only one of her family to make the great journey. That’s why “the names of her kin are not recorded”. You see, they tried to convince her not to go, and that only made her more determined. 

Miriel and Indis used to have this thing where Miriel would sing while Indis plays the instrument. First time Indis caught Maedhros and Fingon doing something similar she got very emotional about it. She told them how she and Miriel also used to have a sort of odd friendship despite their opposite looks and personalities. Maedhros had at this point never even heard that they used to be friends. She proceeded to tell him some fun stories from Miriel’s youth and encouraged the two to spend time together. 

We’re told that Miriel and Finwe only got together in Valinor; Since Indis had a thing for him since before the Vanyar moved out of Tirion it’s fully possible that Indis actually liked him first. Maybe she actually introduced them to each other, like she wasn't confident enough to ask him on a date so she brought her friend, only for the two to be immediately smitten with each other. Poor Indis decided that she had no chance and moved out of town when Ingwe did. 

Miriel definitely expresses her love/admiration in the way of “You! You’re perf! I must make art of you!”

Since his arrival in the halls of Mandos, Feanor has made several of Vaire’s Maiar cry with his critique of their tapestries, but he holds that his mom’s are best. 

Feanor himself

In general, I hold that while he said many things that were not right, there’s a lot of what he prophecied that was not quite wrong and does come true in a kind of way, even if not necessarily for himself and his family. They sort of pave the way as Promethean figures. The second mouse gets the cheese (it’s usually some Nolofinwean)

Though he’s also the ultimate example of “you are not immune to propaganda”. Literally the smartest man in the world; Still touchy enough to be an easy mark for emotional manipulation. 

I think a lot of ff undersells what a polymath he must’ve been and that part where he worked on many different topics and was “the most learned”. 

You know the type of author who has a bazillion unfinished wips going and jumps wildly from topic to topic? Feanor’s research notes are exactly like that, especially the tendency to disintegrate into cryptic jottings and notes right before the most interesting part.  Just like the unfinished texts from HoMe Just like Gauss or Euler, having invented everything a hundred years ahead and 40% more discoveries buried that he never felt ready to publish. (I can also definitely see the sons – especially Maedhros and Curufin – spending the better part of the siege of Angband compiling some of it into a presentable format. Celebrimbor would then be the one to stumble upon implications /corollaries that had somehow been missed for thousands of years. 

For all that I enjoy fics where they’re all smoll and adorable as much as the next person, canonically we’re given every indication that he was an adolescent or young adult by the time the remarriage occurred. The published silm has him “well-nigh full-grown” by the time Indis started having kids; In the HoME passage detailing the romantic meeting on the mountain it’s said that he was “wandering in the mountains” (ie, old enough to do so on his own) at the time. He moved out as soon as he could, so he and his half-siblings never actually spent any significant time in the same household

I mean, he reacted like a teenager would, and IMHO neither his character nor Finwe’s make any sense if this wasn’t a single parent situation early on. 

Personally, I really don’t like that headcanon that he was nicer to the sisters for no reason. I don’t think his relationship with Fingolfin was ever much better than the sort of “awkwardly tolerating” we saw at the reconciliation scene; At the same time, I don’t think things would ever have escalated to that degree if Melkor hadn’t gone mucking things up. 

In the same vein, I don’t think he always had beef with the Valar. He used to hang out in Aule’s halls and let Celegorm study with Orome after all and studied their language. - he certainly seems to have had some romanticism for the Hither Lands evident in his speeches, he traveled far past the well-lit areas, made crystals that shine in starlight etc. so he was probably always somewhat independent-minded and he certainly knew, better than anyone, that the Valar are imperfect and can’t fix everything (they couldn’t heal Miriel after all) - but it’s a long way from healthy skepticism and understandable disappointment to asserting bad intentions where there are none. 

There’s a long way between not wanting a relationship with someone, and pointing stabby objects at them. Feanor was always difficult and never the type of person to be easily satisfied but at the same time, he clearly had his “delight” in his work and life as it was pre-Melkor. He could’ve gone on as an inventor and author of strongly worded opinion pieces; perhaps the elves were even “meant” to go back & come into contact with the Edain for a brief while, just without all the murder. 

The thing about Melkor’s lies is that they made a complicated situation conveniently easy in a way that he (and Fingolfin!) would want to believe. It’s not really either of their fault that they both exist, but if your rival is actually out to get you then suddenly all your negative feelings are justified 

Personally, I don’t think it the remarriage made that much of a difference - Miriel would still be dead. What Feanor’s really mad at is the inherent unfairness of the world. But he can’t fix or fight that, so in a misfire of his engineer’s mindset that thinks in terms of simple cause and effect and wants the world to be logical and controllable, he blamed something tangible (Indis.)

I think Melkor hates him so much because he’s kinda what Melkor wishes he was or likes to think he is. They’re both the mightiest of their respective kinds and don’t really fit in, but Feanor’s actually extremely creative. He goes and does his own thing, and maybe errs in overlooking that no man is an island and that all works are built on those of others, but, look at Melkor who wants all the scale of a group project but none of the “cooperation” part and basically can’t make anything of his own. “You’re like me, yet you’re successful? I cannot allow it!” 

In a sense you have classic Satan and Miltonian satan in the same setting, and they can’t stand each other

[grell-writes-stuff]

A Self-Indulgent Second Chapter

Acknowledge me! First Chapter Here

Words: 3588

Genre: Young Adult/Paranormal

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I wake up reluctantly to Ivy poking my face at two o’clock in the morning. She’s already back in leggings and a hoodie, and contains an unwarranted amount of pep for such an early hour. I rub my eyes, grab my own sweatshirt to fight off the chill of the middle of the night, and rise.

“Okay. Let’s do this.”

“That’s what you’re wearing?” Her damning gaze judges my pajamas.

“Ivy, I need you to understand that I’m not putting in more effort than the bare minimum in order to go sit around in a graveyard with you at three a.m.”

Her eyes roll, but she ultimately drops it, and we’re out my bedroom window, walking along the roof over the back porch, and carefully scaling down the trellis at the side of the house. We cut across the unfenced yards of our neighbours. The last house at the corner before we make it to the sidewalk is Ivy’s. We walk under the big beech and shabby treehouse that we used to play in and that is most certainly a deathtrap. It’s intentionally a deathtrap. Ivy literally read the OSHA guidelines to see how many petty requirements she could ignore in one project. Her dad was building it though, so there’s not too many infractions, but I still almost broke multiple extremities on multiple occasions.

The streets of Kinross eventually lead us to Riverview Cemetery, the massive graveyard bordered by the woods near the edge of town just where the houses and other outskirts buildings begin to spread further apart. I know for a fact that the fence out front only extends about halfway around the whole place to decorate the side of the road, so it’s easy to break in, however it still takes me two full minutes to talk Ivy into taking that route and out of her idea to scale the locked, iron gate looming in the darkness. Chances are she’d scurry up it like Spiderman and I’d impale myself on one of the points at the top. We hike through the trees and sneak inside where the stone wall begins to crumble.

“All right,” Ivy huffs triumphantly. “Now we just have to find her.”

“Find her? You said you knew where she was.”

“Yes, I do. In the historical section…somewhere.”

“Ivy!”

“What?”

I’m happy it’s dark so she can’t see my exasperation because I’d get a lecture on optimism otherwise. I slip on what I think it a neutral-feeling face, and pull my phone out for a second. I blink away the blinding brightness while I check. “Okay, well, if you actually want to be at her grave at three, you’ve got, like, under ten minutes.”

That seems to be enough for her because Ivy begins to march ahead between the headstones. I shove my phone in the pocket of my hoodie and trail her with an air of reluctance and a want to get this over with and take my money from her bad bet.

Both Ivy and I come to Riverview what I would consider a normal amount and, more importantly, exclusively – until now – when it is light out. I probably come more than she does though. Ivy will stop by every few years to say hello to her Grandpa Gil who died before she was even born, but my dad and I come twice a year for my mom: once on her birthday, and once on the anniversary of her death. She passed away when I was really little, so I don’t remember her, but everyone who knew her made sure I learned what kind of person she was through stories and stuff. My dad couldn’t speak more highly of her, but his retellings always hold a tinge of hasty justification for their whole relationship because my mom was gay, and so is my dad. Growing up, they’d always been best friends, and so the other person seemed as perfect as could be for a lie that would turn out to be mutual in the end. They only both came out to each other after my mom got sick, and by then they were a few years in to a marriage that was domestically comfortable, but nothing more, and had already had me. I don’t really feel so sentimental when anyone mentions the absence of my mom because I was really young. I end up sadder that she was taken while trapped in the lie of heteronormative narrative and never had the chance to experience the kind of love she wanted to have beyond the platonic and familial feelings she shared with my dad and I.

Ivy and I walk past the sections we’re familiar with toward the back of the graveyard where the stretch of ancient headstones begins. Kinross was founded way back when America was just a group of colonies and Massachusetts was dotted with clumps of communities built by pilgrims and Puritans. They needed a place to put their dead people, and so Riverview was established a couple miles from the Hollins River which runs on the edge of town. Only groundskeepers come back this way as far as I know since the names on most of the rocks have faded into obscurity, and the only ones that are remotely recognizable belong to the people we learn about in school for a week leading up to Founder’s Day.

I slip my phone out again and check the time. “Five minutes.”

“I know, I know. Shut up. She’s around here somewhere.”

“Couldn’t you have just Googled a map of the plots? You read the most obscure documents for fun, but fact-checking this–”

“One lapse in good planning, and I get lectured.”

“Ivy.”

“Okay, okay! This way.”

I’m pretty sure she just picks a random direction. She yanks her phone from the waist of her leggings and the beam of the flashlight cuts through the darkness and starts inspecting epitaphs. I leave her to it, and she doesn’t complain because she must have guessed I wouldn’t be willing to help her when I didn’t want to be here in the first place. I periodically take my phone out to glance at it and count down her time limit in my head when, suddenly, Ivy says:

“Oh, fuck yes.”

I look up and follow her light as it points toward one of the larger monuments, a giant, grey mausoleum with cracks and crumbles and a chained, iron gate as it’s front door. It’s flanked on all sides by overgrowth and tall flowering plants that look rich and purple in the peripheral of the beam. She raises her phone so it illuminates the name carved just below the peak of the roof: Ann-Marie Kelly.

“Okay, Ivy,” I start before I have to take a pause. I feel her gaze land on me while I inhale. “I don’t mean to discredit your apparently strong belief in witches, but would they give an actual accused witch an entire, enormous mausoleum like this if anyone actually believed she was magically terrorizing Kinross?”

“Oh, Sid, she had allies. Have you really not heard this story?”

“No, Ivy. I really don’t care about what was going on in Kinross in seventeen-whatever.”

“Sixteen-whatever,” she corrects before she slides her phone back into her pocket and struts up to the tomb.

I groan loud enough for her to hear it and follow, but I barely make it onto the concrete step just outside the door before Ivy’s foot connects with the gate and makes the chains rattle.

“Oh, my God, Ivy.”

She ignores me and kicks again. “Wake up, Annie! Sid’s gonna owe me money!”

“Ivy, stop.”

“Okay, but one more.” I don’t have a chance to object because she quickly lines herself up and swings her leg, and delivers one massive blow directly to the center of the barrier and –

The chains and padlock clatter onto the stone at our feet, and we both jump at the sudden noise. Our eyes are both wide, but in very different ways. I’m shocked. As old as this building seems to be, I did not expect that.

“Holy shit. Completely rusted through,” Ivy observes with glee. From the corner of my eye I catch a particular sparkle of something that I don’t like a split second before she suggests, “Dude, we’re going in.”

“No, we are not.”

She’s already pulling open the gate, and the sound it makes reverberates through the silent night, the squeal of something dying in agony. While I’m recovering from the assault to my ears, she’s stepped inside the structure and disappeared into the blackness. I call her name, but there isn’t a response, and when I try again, there’s a pause and a begging, “Sid, come on!”

I hesitate for a moment, like I’m sure anybody standing outside of a mausoleum at three in the morning would, before I trail her in. Then something clamps around my arm, and a noise catches in my throat while I leap out of my skin.

“Jesus, Sid! It’s just me!” Ivy turns her phone’s flashlight back on and we can see each other yet again, her smug, me only slightly less terrified than I was a beat ago.

“Don’t do that!”

“Sorry.” She sounds only half-sorry as she releases my arm, and then she sits on the filthy, hard floor right in front of a big, long box, the sight of which forms a pit in my stomach. She sets her phone before her, face down so the flashlight beams up at the ceiling, and reaches to pat the spot across from her. “Sit. I’ll tell you the age-old tale of Ann Kelly, Kinross’ first and last witch.”

“Ivy, I will pay you if we can leave right now.”

“No, sit.”

I put everything inside of my lungs into my sigh before I sit and kick up dust and cough. I pull my inhaler from my sweatpants’ pocket to take a puff so I can ensure I don’t suffocate on the grime in this horrible place, while Ivy launches into her story with a shit-eating grin and exaggerated, formal diction.

“In fair Kinross of the sixteen-nineties where everyone was farming, religious, and paranoid is where we lay our scene. In the other corners of our state, pointed fingers were frantically flying to women of questionable affairs in order to defame them with accusations of witchcraft, and Ann Kelly was no exception. She was accused by some guy of blasphemy, of murder, and of bewitching her young niece who was visiting town. She was ultimately arrested and brought to trial.

“The trial lasted I-don’t-know-how-long, with a verdict of guilty-as-hell, and Ann Kelly was sentenced to be hung. Perhaps, dear Sid, perhaps, as you suggest, she was just some unfortunate woman, but on the day of Ann Kelly’s execution, when the rope was placed around her at the gallows erected in town square, when she was asked to say her final words before the platform dropped, her neck snapped, and she slowly and painfully died, Ann Kelly secured her title as ‘The Witch of Kinross.’ For, you see, Ann Kelly, in front of eye witnesses and all the divine people watching Upstairs, placed a curse upon the executioner” – she slips into a gravelly, spooky voice – “‘An eye for an eye, a claw for a claw, thou accuseth a false Devil, thou art the beast he hath saw–!’”

“Are you done?” I interrupt her theatrics.

Her voice turns to normal again with the volume cranked up. “Blah, blah, blah, they hung her. But her niece contacted her brother and nephew. They came down to Kinross and Ann Kelly’s husband and brother murdered the executioner as revenge. I mean, it wasn’t well-thought-out revenge because then they were hanged, but yeah. That’s the Ann Kelly story.”

“Awesome. Great. So worth breaking into a graveyard at three in the–”

Bang!

The tomb seems to shudder with the noise, the sound of something rock-solid slamming against the back wall, resonating through the floor beneath us and travelling up my spine as a striking chill. My mouth hangs wide open, stopped mid-thought, and Ivy’s brows abruptly rise and then knit together. For a long time, it’s completely silent in the cold darkness inside the mausoleum and we sit like statues.

When I can speak again, I only just stop myself from using one of Ivy’s favourite swears, and find a substitute. “Ivy, what the hell?!”

She looks up at me like soon-to-be roadkill.

For a moment, I can’t keep the anger and accusation out of my voice, masking the constricting grip clamping around my heart and throat. “Who’s out there?! Who’d you get to help prank me?! Someone from the soccer team? Julia? Abby?”

I cut off my demands when I really see her face angled by the shadows. Her lips are hanging parted and mouth the word “no” like she can’t get it out. Her eyes are twinkling with worry emphasized by her crumpled brows. Fear. The quiet stretches between us for a too-long pause this time. Only our tandem, careful breaths echo in the chamber as we wait for…for something.

Snap!

The small crunch of a twig, soft as it travels through the open doorway from the direction of the east wall of the mausoleum. It reverberates up my spine like it’s tangible. A branch could break beneath anything, but after the loud hammer to the side of the structure… My gut churns with an uneasy vibe. Ivy vocalizes her own unwanted feeling to herself before turning to me again.

“Run for it?” Ivy’s voice is tiny enclosed by the darkness.

“Brisk walk?” I suggest.

“You have your inhaler,” she states pointedly, getting up. “We run.”

I curse under my breath, but give in because she’s right. If we get caught after breaking into somebody’s grave, our parents find out, and we are in an unfathomable amount of trouble. Ivy pushes past me with a quickened stride that I match until we’ve both stepped off the concrete slab just outside the door and into the overgrown grass and purple flowers. Then we’re scrambling into a run toward the night, dashing ahead in a straight line to dodge the headstones sticking out of the ground like blunt fingertips ready to grab us. Two sets of footsteps violently stomp on the earth…until we break into the treeline, and the third joins the noise of our escape and my desperate pants rising in volume.

My chest has been lit on fire. I gasp, “Ivy!”

“Don’t use names!” she yells back to me. “Just keep going! Just keep going!”

I try, and I push myself like I’ve never had to before, placing one foot before the other, taking in what air I can and holding it so I have something in my screaming lungs at least for a moment. But my feet are starting to stumble and my clenched hands begin trembling because I can’t breathe. My heart is overclocking from exertion and panic. I fall behind Ivy, the silhouette of her auburn ponytail disappearing into the blackness ahead while a pain flares in my side.

I yank my inhaler from my pocket again and take a puff, but it’s impossible to hold it in long enough while running and suffocating at the same time. My steps have to slow down more and more so I can actually let my crap lungs jumpstart again. What I’m doing can just barely be defined as jogging, and even that’s pushing it. My chest wants to explode!

Slam!

Gasp!

My shoulder hits the earth hard and the air escapes from me instantly in one forced exhale. Something heavy lands on top of me, pinning me down, and I want to yell at Ivy and threaten that she’d better stop this stupid prank or else, but I can’t speak with empty lungs.

But neither can I scream with empty lungs, and yet I manage to because I am offered no other choice. The skin of my thigh breaks open. Sharp hands support themselves on my chest for just a moment, though I only barely register their weight before it leaves all together. My leg feels like it took fourteen different knives to it, and it’s wet and hot. I scream more.

I keep gasping in what I can and it just comes out as weak noises of pain – agony – shooting up my body. I feel my heartbeat pulsing in the wound. And through it all, I hear from the trees, “Sid! Sid!”

Ivy.

She catches up with her voice calling my name, and her feet trample through the brambles, but…but from the opposite direction my attacker had flown in. A light blinds me for a second while she drops down onto her knees at my side and I hear her tone quivering as she uses her favourite swears over and over again. My eyes follow her flashlight.

There are uneven tears in my pants, the fabric already soaked through in a deep red. Blood. My own blackening blood pouring out of me. Immediately, my stomach lurches, and I have just enough time to get myself up on my elbows, and turn away from Ivy before everything inside of me comes up. I can not handle blood. Any blood. But my blood is so much worse. My stomach convulses and my throat burns.

“Sid? Sid, it’s okay. It’s okay. Just…just don’t think about it. It’s okay.” Ivy’s speaking so fast, and it sounds like she’s trying to convince herself and not me. She shrugs off her hoodie. I’m just getting back my breaths after losing my dinner on the forest floor, but they’re all shaky.

Ivy attempts to bend my leg at the knee, but I yelp when the sting abruptly travels from my leg through the rest of me like a bullet train. She hums something softly, but I have a moment of seeing stars, and everything sounds garbled. Then there’s pressure on my thigh. She’s tied her sweater around it as a makeshift tourniquet.

“Come on,” she says quickly. “We have to get out of here. We need to leave.”

Before I can protest, she grabs my arm and throws it over her shoulders before managing to haul me up to my one leg. I can’t bring myself to say much because that image is burned into my brain, and my raw throat tastes bile down at the base already. I can’t look down. Ivy is seven inches shorter than me – she is down and I tower above her – and she somehow has it in herself to be my support. I wince trying to put any pressure on that limb because the result is blinding pain.

“Stay with me, Sid,” she coaxes, and I find her repeating that as she limps me out of the woods. She doesn’t stop talking, or saying those things to me. The trees all look like blurs and dancing, random lines, but Ivy is something I can grasp. When I feel like I’m about to trip and fall off of the face of the earth, Ivy is what grounds me to reality.

 ***

Ivy announces there’s no way I’m climbing through my bedroom window, and I don’t have to be a genius to agree with her. She hobbles me up onto the porch, we use the spare key, and we try to hop upstairs as quiet as we possibly can so we don’t wake my dad. Ivy sits me on my bed and disappears to grab something more reliable than her sweater which I am certain is absolutely ruined now – I don’t have the stomach to check, or anything left in my stomach to throw back up if I check.

When she comes back with a wet cloth, she cleans my wound while my eyes stay firmly fixed on my ceiling. I decide to screw it and liberally use Ivy’s entire dictionary of swears as whispers, grunts, and groans each time the sting intensifies.

“It looks really, really bad, Sid,” she tells me. “It’s like something big bit you. You need a doctor, like, right now.”

“No!” – a muttered curse injects itself between my thoughts – “No doctors, Ivy. Your parents and my dad will be pissed.”

“Your dad will be more pissed at me if you die.”

I catch her gaze and ignore everything in my peripheral. I think we’re giving each other the same look on our tear-streaked faces: eyes that are shiny, lips in straight lines threatening to turn down at any moment. We hold that for a few seconds, neither of us saying anything because she’s right – she is – but I tell myself the opposite. I tell myself that “It can’t be that bad.”

“Ivy–”

“Will you stop being such a man?!” she demands with some fire in her tone. There’s a pause, and then she pulls the washcloth away. “Fine, okay. We’ll give it a week, but that’s it. If it still looks… One week. I mean it.”

I relent and breathe, “Okay.”

She nods and grabs the spool of bandages she managed to dig out. She proceeds to wrap them tight around my thigh while I hiss complaints, fingernails digging into my sheets. She secures it and sniffs something away, like trying to banish this night from her memory.

“You know, if you go rabid, I’ll have to be the one to shoot you,” she jokes flatly, even though neither of us have the energy to appreciate it.