#this is just outing me for my obsession with that one Aragorn-Warg cliff seen from the second movie

[captainderyn]

[Fictober] 17. “Are you serious?”

Prompt: 17. “Are you serious?”

Genre: Fanfiction (LOTRO)

Rating: T

Pairing: Raenor/Wulfwryn

CW: Mentions/description of injury

Summary: On the snowy plains of the Misty Mountains a fight goes wrong, leaving Wulfwryn to deal with the consequences.

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They were surrounded. 

All over the snowy plain goblins and wargs raced towards them, flitting in and out of view in the blizzarding snow. 

Though her ears rang from the roaring incantations Raenor threw at the encroaching enemies she could still make out the cackling of the goblins and the low, throaty snarls of the wargs. 

She hadn’t seen monstrous creatures such as these since the North Downs and Lone-Lands. Long before she’d come to know Raenor’s shoulder pressed into her back or the familiar way they worked in tandem like dancers on a stage. 

She slammed her shield into a goblin, tossing it back into the snow. Her sword flashed in a deadly arc, and she yanked it back with a rattling gasp. 

They’d been fighting for what seemed like forever, inching closer and closer to the snowy edge of a gully. The goblins were pushing them back towards the foothills of the mountains, hoping to back them into the corner. 

“Wulfwryn!” Raenor shouted over the shuffling footfalls of the enemy, “When you say you love me, are you serious?” 

When she said…Wulfwryn bashed her shield into the nose of a warg, sending it skittering back with a yelp. A well aimed blow felled that creature too, only for another well on its way to taking its vacancy.

“Now is not really the time!” she snapped back. 

Raenor’s voice took a manic edge to it, “Answer me.”

The force in his usually soft, even voice shocked the words from her throat: “Of course I mean it!” 

    If she were facing him, and his back were not pressed against hers instead, she would’ve seen a grim smile grace his face. 

    A weight slammed into her back, sending her toppling forward. 

    Her face wet the snow in a burst of freezing and sharp pain, all breath leaving her body as she was sent rolling by a second force slamming into her side. 

    A shadow flew above her, a ragged cry with it. 

    Her vision went red even before she was on her knees, then scrambling to her feet. The snow slid her feet from under her, sending her down again in a flurry of powdered snow and razor sharp ice. 

    “Raenor!” she roared, even as the snow still blinded her. 

    She could see just enough, the red path trailing over the edge of the gully. The snarling of a warg warning goblins from its prey. 

    Her sword knew no mercy as she careened over the edge of the gully, the few foot drop buckling her knees. The warg gave a mighty yelp, snapping at her, but its ferocity could not match the feral rage that set fire to her blood. 

    In the far distance a horn blew, sending the goblins amassing at the top of the gully skittering back towards their masters. 

    Wulfwryn discarded her sword, threw aside her shield. 

    “No, no, you idiot.” she hit the ground beside Raenor, warrior’s hands--not healer’s hands--hovering over the tattered fabric of his tunic.

    No elven fabric, made for light battle, could withstand the sharp bite of a warg’s teeth or their sheer jaw strength. Neat punctures lined across his chest and over his shoulder. 

    Did goblins lace their wargs with poison as they did their blades? She’d never heard of it, but she’d learned long ago never to discount any possibility. 

    Her head went light at the wounds. 

    Elves bled as red as men. 

    “Raenor.” She snarled, ripping her cloak from her shoulders and pressing it tightly to his chest and shoulder. Blood trailed from his temple, no doubt from the dragging fal, “You stupid, stupid elf, what do you think you’re doing?” 

    She cast around for any sign of…something, she didn’t know what. 

    This snowy plain was far from any of the dwarven camps, and they would not be equipped to handle this. 

    He certainly wouldn’t bleed out, of that much her rudimentary skills could tell her, but there were far more sinister things they came from wargish wounds. Their bites were nasty, prone to all manner of festering issues. 

    “Stupid, stupid elf.” She repeated under her breath before sucking a deep breath in. She did her best to imitate the whistle the elves had taught her for their mounts. They’d left the horses forging for sprouts beneath the snow cover before they’d stepped foot on the plain. She prayed the fighting hadn’t scared them back to the camp. 

    She tugged Raenor off the snow and half onto her lap, brushing the snow from his hair. It was ridiculous, there were better things to worry about, but all she could think was how desperately he hated the feeling of clumped snow against the back of his neck. 

    “I’m going to kill you myself if you die on me.” she growled, “I might do it anyway.” 

    She whistled again and after several long moments a speckled gray horse appeared over the edge of the gully. She would have cried. 

    The horse perched at the edge of the gully, head overhanging and gave a loud snort. 

    Wulfwryn extended her hand, “Please.” she’d never begged a horse before, “Please, we need you.” 

    With another bellowing snort the horse eased its way down the hill, slipping and sliding until halting beside Wulfwryn. It sniffed at her hair before dropping its head to whuffle at Raenor’s cheek. 

    It seemed to know who its real kin was. 

    She pushed her freezing muscles to standing, pulling Raenor up with her. He groaned, his weight lolling into her side. 

    The stories always said elven horses were far more intelligent than they should be, but Wulfwryn witnessed it before her eyes as the horse eased itself down onto its knees. Enough so that Wulfwryn could pull Raenor on and scramble up herself. 

    She caressed the horse’s neck when it scrambled to its feet, “Thank you.” she murmured, before looking into the swirling snow. She didn’t know if the horses understood the common tongue, or if it understood speech at all, “What is it your people say? Niro Lim, to Rivendell.” 

    The horse gathered like a spring beneath her, leaping up the embankment. It dug its hooves into the snow and ran like it was made of wind itself. 

[caitlinsfandomthoughts]

A film fan’s reaction to reading The Lord of the Rings for the first time.

I’ve been a big fan of the Peter Jackson films (extended versions - nerd that I am) since I was about 11 and I think I know all of the big changes made in the adaptation: Arwen, Faramir, Aragorn falling off a cliff. I did read the first book around the same age (in the first of many waves of my lotr obsession) but I only really remembered Saruman of ‘Many Colours’.

However I have always wanted to properly know the book version of the story so finally started listening to an amazing full audio book reading by Steven Red Fox Garnett which I highly recommend:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwLvFU2onc7cPIEBee-_xMw

………………………………………………………………………………….

And here are my silly reactions and occasional analysis of the differences between book and film that I didn’t know about.  

The Fellowship of the Ring part four, one, two, three, five, six

The Ring Goes South:

The sword is remade already?!!!! I’m trying to be ok with this but I don’t like it. I don’t like it. In fact this and by extension the characterisation of Aragorn is the only difference I haven’t liked so far. Everything else is like I understand why they didn’t have room for this or changed that, but it works fine the way it is in the book as well, different mediums and all that.

The scene when Bilbo gives Frodo Sting and the mithril is now a nice, bittersweet scene, since Nosferatu-Bilbo is behind us. There was an air of sadness to it, like Bilbo was intentionally trying to keep his and Frodo’s spirits up, focusing on how he has to write it all up when he comes back. I felt he was trying to ignore the high likehood of Frodo not coming back. And the pain that he was sending his younger heir into danger rather than himself. In general the book has done a better job at making me care about the Bilbo Frodo relationship so far. In the film I did feel a little like I was told how much Bilbo meant to Frodo, and it wasn’t that I didn’t believe it but I didn’t feel it that deeply. In the book there is more time, and we get more of a sense that Bilbo was one of the only people Frodo felt really understood him, despite having good friends like Merry and Pippin (Sam not being as close to him YET). Frodo being a bit more of an outsider in The Shire does help explain to me why the ring messes him up so badly, metaphorically, outside of the in-universe reason that the ring just does that. In the film Frodo is shown to be quite happy and well-adjusted in The Shire, in order to contrast how depressed he is when he gets back and it works well, and always gets me in the feels (poor sweet innocent Frodo! Little does he know). But I like adding the book characterisation to flesh out pre-adventure Frodo in my mind. (Oh I’m just realising this works well with a queer reading of Frodo too).

Tolkien really wants you to know that Boromir has big, strong, thick arms.

On the mountains there is no ‘let the ringbearer decide’ which I always thought was kind silly in the film. Like he doesn’t know, and he’s not a leader, isn’t the point of a random hobbit having the ring that he doesn’t have power? Don’t go and give him a sense of power.

A Journey in the Dark:

Ok so there is some focus on Frodo’s opinion on whether they go to Moria or not but it doesn’t actually influence their decision because…

Wargs! And we don’t know if Bill will survive them, but Gandalf does some magic to protect him maybe. Bill must be protected.

Frodo doesn’t get to solve the riddle :(

It’s Borormir’s fault the kraken thing attacks.  The attack is less over the top, which I prefer, and I think this might be the case for many upcoming fight scenes. Gandalf wonders why it went specifically for Frodo hmmmm.

I think the journey through Moria so far might be the first part of the adventure where I think I’m enjoying the book version more. There is a great sense of unease, the film isn’t (and probably couldn’t be) as dark as described in the book, where only the faint light of Gandalf’s staff can be seen and everything else is just a mystery. The fact that they are there for longer also adds to the forebodingness. Whereas before the slower pace than the film somewhat lessoned the urgency, here it gives you a better sense of their ordeal.

No silly ride-the-broken-stair-and-conveniently-it’s-the-two-most-protagonisty-characters-that-are-left scene. Which I appreciate.

Frodo can sense evil and generally shady spirit things since he was stabbed by the Ringwraith! This is a cool thing I wish they kept in the films. This is some soft magic system coolness.

‘Fool of a Took!’ The Pippin Gandalf dynamic is there. I can’t wait to see how it changes when they are in Minas Tirith.

Sam wanted to learn Gimli’s song. Sam really is a songwriter! Doomed to just be a gardener because of the class system. I really like that Sam is given this character trait outside just being the amazing caring hobbit we know he is. It’s something about who he is outside of Frodo.

The Bridge of Khazad-Dum:

Ah so Balin was trying to retake Moria. That makes sense. It did seem weird that Gimli was surprised to find him dead in the film. Like Dwarf intel really moves slowly. Here he is disappointed, not surprised.

To be fair mithril is only the second most valuable and rare heirloom Frodo got from Bilbo. He’s quite protective of both.

I find the action scenes here had more tension for me than in the film. By the next two films the battle scenes had the appropriate tension and dread, but I was surprised by how much more on the edge of my seat I was listening to it described here than the film version which exaggerates the amount of orcs so much that it loses some effect (this is a credit to Steven Garnett as well).

Aragorn throws some shade on Gandalf right after they get out and is like I told you not to go this way.