#thank you welcomingdisaster!

[searchingforserendipity25]

Curufin!

Character Ask Game 💚🤍🖤

Thank you @welcomingdisaster! :)

Give me a character and I will give you my thoughts on

Curufin

one aspect about them i love 

Favourite Daughter Syndrome, and committed to it. 

one aspect i wish more people understood about them

As much Aredhel’s friend as Celegorm or Caranthir. Well-spoken and very compelling; very strongly attuned to everyone's position and presentation in any conversation, and when he talks/acts it's very deliberately a give-take-overcome situation, both in Nargothrond and confronting Beren and Lúthien.

Very reactive, aware of other people's possible reactions. Shows a remarkable talent in slipping in and saying the correct thing at the correct time with fantastic oration skills. These are good qualities and not evil in themselves! It's what he uses them for that's the problem.

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have about this character

Genuinely liked Telchar more than most elves, including his brothers. A true friendship of like minds, soul sisters of the craft, bffs of the forge. Celebrimbor wants what they have (and he gets it with Narvi, but not after pining after a number of cool dwarrows and having his hopes for a partnership dashed.) 

as well as

one character i love seeing them interact with

Finrod. Everything about the bonds of betrayal and gratitude and betrayal again, mutual attraction and mutual (dis)illusionment, a far clearer mutual understanding than either of them wants to admit, both regarding the best and the worst parts of their characters…

one character i wish they would interact with/interact with more

Aredhel! Again, I find their friendship fascinating.

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have that involve them and one other character

Felt pretty bad - as in, mind-breaking guilt very badly managed - about telling Eöl where Aredhel and Maeglin were going, in hindsight; but genuinely thought this was a political move on Aredhel’s part at the time.

Marry a Sindarin lord, start thawing Turgon’s anger about her disappearance by presenting her cute kid, and then her husband shows up and boom! diplomacy happens. There’s a half-Noldo with a feet in Nan Elmoth. Not a bad choice, as far as he's concerned; Finrod and his siblings have Thingol’s favour, the Feanorians are all out, where does that leave Fingolfin and his children in terms of footing?  Eöl’s chase seems consistent to what he knows of Aredhel - hardly the first time she got an idea in her head and left others behind in the assumption they’d do what she planned them to do.

He didn’t at all think she did it on purpose for mere political convenience - Aredhel only does her own convenience, mostly, and power plays of the polis kind aren't her thing. But he knows how she chafes at restriction and longs for vastness, control, agency and liberty, and if she fell in love with a treacherous sentient forest, well, it’s not that surprising. 

Curufin’s failure is always in underestimating everyone else. The forest gripped Aredhel not the other way around. 

Quite envious that Turgon got to kill Eöl - but also very glad that he wasn’t the one to do it and deal with the consequences to his network in Himlad and in the dwarrow kingdoms.

Knowing Eöl, he suspected the consequences would be quite terrible; would not have been surprised at the Doom he cast over Gondolin, and indeed counted on it and mentally scrapped Gondolin as any kind of use afterwards (went so far as to be glad that they weren't joining the Union, and lowkey blamed them for the defeat and how it changed their plans/added another Doom).

If Aredhel and Maeglin had stayed in Himlad, Curufin would have done so much for them (derrogatory but mostly well intended). The coup of Nan Elmoth by Maeglin’s regents would be truly a tale for the ages (a horror tale). Strangling vines, poisonous ponds, anti-colonialist spiders, Aredhel vs Mablung in a fight for survival in the wilds when Thingol sends someone to figure out what’s going on, Maeglin running around with a cursed blade - we could have had it all! 

[polutrope]

weird and controversial ships hmmmm.... elwing/maglor, feanolo, indis/nerdanel?

[ship bingo]

Elwing/Maglor

Yes. They're both hot (to me), she hates him, he would do anything (anything) to redeem himself in her eyes. He won't but she'll still fuck him. Dynamic is Maglor guilt-fucking, Elwing like, "Yeah, I deserve this. Please me, kinslayer -- also don't talk." They are both surprised to find they have amazing chemistry and it gets pretty kinky. Earendil backs it, sometimes watches, rarely partakes. Elrond and Elros think it's funny as hell.

I need them to kill each other = I need her to kill him. With hotness.

That's my take, but for another great (and darker) one, may I recommend: Elwing/f!Maglor by simaetha.

Feanor/Fingolfin

@ettelene is gonna be mad at me for not saying Soulmates but I'm still in my toxic sibcest era lol. UST more than hatefuck though. I do think kissing could fix them though, and I like a Feanor Lives AU where they fuck-to-fix-it.

Some Fave Feanolos:

The Revolutionary and the Usurper by Encairion (imo a masterpiece of Feanor characterisation, complicated relationships, and super hot smut scenes)

All of them by Ettelene but A Clash of swords is so much fun and showcases her talent for group dynamics as well as smut.

hell is empty and we are here by @crownlessliestheking. More pre-slash but their dynamic here is so perfectly spiky.

Indis/Nerdanel

100% sold on this by you. Prefer it to Mindis. Everyone, may I highly recommend stone toys by welcomingdisaster.

[southfarthing]

turgon!

one aspect about them i love

he still has so much kindness and warmth despite having every reason to be cold 🥹🥹🥹 the way he takes maeglin in...the way he treats hurin and huor.... and later tuor........this guy has seen most of his family die horrible deaths but he's still .... he's so 🥹 he can have a little pride as a treat

one aspect i wish more people understood about them

I feel like we're not talking about his charismatic leadership as much as we should

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have about this character

he's so girldad 😭😭😭😭 also of his siblings, he's the most similar to fingolfin

one character i love seeing them interact with

fingon and finrod!! and idril + aredhel!! and maeglin 😭

one character i wish they would interact with/interact with more

... fingon. all his siblings tbh. and elenwë and idril!!! and the sons of fëanor actually - I feel like that would be juicy

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have that involve them and one other character

his relationship with fingon became rocky during the exile/helcaraxë/first few years of the sun, but after fingolfin's body was brought to him and it hit turgon how small their family had become, he decided he would try to fix things. fingon never asked him to join the union of maedhros, not knowing where he was (and perhaps, not willing to ask and then be disappointed and humiliated), but turgon prepared his forces anyway and went to him

[thelordofgifs]

sorry to live blog this in ur inbox but i feel like i blinked and tfs is 400 miles away from where i remembered it. omg (omg) the clear silver horn of fingolfin!!! HOLY SHIT!! aaaaaa. fingon having his dumbass romantic moment staring at the VISCERA ON MAEDHROS'S SWORD??? maglor bargaining his life for curufin's?? fuck curufin is going to kill maglor isn't he

NO DON’T APOLOGISE A LIVEBLOG IS THE BEST GIFT I COULD GET anyway YES I’m kind of always obsessed with all the violence that’s so essential to russingon tbh? Like Alqualondë and the making of the Union and their big romantic rescue which definitely involved Maedhros bleeding all over the place – theirs is a relationship absolutely soaked in gore. They are WARLORDS and they love that about each other and we are just kind of staring at them in horrified fascination. So Fingon finding violent killer!Maedhros Extremely Sexy was so important to me and I’m so glad you picked up on it!

No word yet on future plans for Curufin - that’s a theory I haven’t heard before though! :)

[cowboyhorsegirl]

which book was it omg

i'll recc you a book tell me what you're looking for

fjksdfjksf okay in the book's defense it's an anthology and i haven't finished it yet so we can still hold out hope that at least something in there is gonna be outstanding

but it's called Trans Love: An Anthology of Transgender and Nonbinary Voices, edited by Freiya Benson & i will update you all if i find anything i like but so far all of the writing has just kind of fallen flat for me

& i'd be so excited to read anything you rec, but I particularly love graphic novels and books about queer history <3

[grey-gazania]

ooo for the WIP game i'll ask for... red, finwë, bitter, & sweet!

Red, from a piece about Caranthir and his soon-to-wife that I'm currently trying to polish up for Tolkien OC Week:

When Atto straightened up, there was something in his hands -- a folded piece of fabric, richly embroidered in shades of red. I knew immediately whose work it was.

Couldn't find Finwë on his own, but I did find it as half of Nolofinwë, from a future chapter of Half Past Ten in the Rose Garden:

Nolofinwë chokes on his wine as Atto guffaws.

Bitter turns up in my rough draft of a future Woman King AU piece about Gil-galad and her mother reacting to Maedhros' death.

“Well, he's not here to see it,” Gil-galad said, and Ianneth could hear the bitterness in her daughter's voice. “He's not here because Maedhros got him killed. So I say good riddance to that murderer and his bloody hands. Hand,” she corrected herself.

Sweet appears in my as-yet-unpublished outsider POV ficlet about Elrond & Elros' early days with Maedhros and Maglor:

As I leaned closer, I caught a whiff of the sweet scent of the healing herbs that Melloth must have used to cleanse his wound.

work in progress guessing game || @welcomingdisaster

[melestasflight]

WIP Wednesday Thursday

a 'lil something that I hope to wrap up for @tolkienhorrorweek

Maedhros’ first glimpse of Ossiriand was a sketch that Finrod had sent him, along with an elaborate letter detailing his adventures. Maedhros had not believed it possible. An artistic exaggeration perhaps, a small liberty of the wonderer’s passion. It was art done by Finrod, after all, a being who sought and found beauty in all things, even those deemed by others as most dull, ugly even.

But now he begins to realize that Finrod’s drawing was merely nudging the door open to a world of its own. Ossiriand is a marvel beyond imagination.

thanks for the holler @welcomingdisaster. summoning @eilinelsghost @queerofthedagger @ao3-quente to share a snippet of your wips, if you so fancy

[kanskje-kaffe]

Seven Sentences Saturday from your WIP

Thank youuuu @curufiin for the tag!!

From the current chapter of The Madrigal I'm working on (Silvergifting):

There must have been innumerable moments like that. They had shared ninety late summers, and Narvi was always coming and going, especially when the weather made for pleasant travel above ground. Celebrimbor had plenty such memories of his own. Annatar's golden hair turning white in the sunlight. Droplets of water running between strong, clever fingers as he washed his hands. Snowflakes caught on his silver eyelashes, in the instant before they melted. Annatar was always warm.

I tag:

@kevystel

@spicedrobot

@trash-ainu

@withercrown

@aran-morinorea

@myceliumelium

@finmoryo

@elevenelvenswords

@welcomingdisaster

@queerofthedagger

annnnd @curufiin because i would like to see more haha! ;3c

If I didn't tag you, but you're reading this and you have a Silm wip, please consider yourself tagged and @ me so I can read your stuff!!!!

[thescrapwitch]

Multiple Words Monday

Thank you @thelordofgifs and @eilinelsghost for tagging me! This is from Psalm for the Strange, another bonus eldritch!Maglor story. Unlike the rest of the series, it leans much more into the cozy than horror elements. It focuses on a Maglor, Lindir and a few other bards entering a song competition in Valinor. Or, trying to. (Its also in Lindir's POV, which I have missed writing) Here's a little snippet of it:

“It - I mean, he can’t compete.”

“Why not?” asked Lindir.

I followed the instructions and filled out the form in advance, said Maglor. 

“It's not the form. It's that, well…” She looked like she wanted to hide under the table rather than talk to them. “It's against the rules for creatures like you to compete!”

“Oh really?” Lindir put his hands on his hips. “And where, exactly, in this rulebook of yours, does it say that ‘eldritch-creatures cannot compete in song competitions in Valinor?’ Because if it's not in there, then you must be making it up, and if you’re making it up then that’s extremely rude of you and honestly lowers my faith in your ability to judge this competition fairly.”

Tagging: @camille-lachenille @dreamingthroughthenoise @chthonion @lordgrimwing @welcomingdisaster @searchingforserendipity25 and whoever else wants to join in!

[outofangband]

Continuing on my theme today of Melian and Thingol, this is a poem of the wonderful @welcomingdisaster that she allowed me to translate into Tengwar!

Thank you, Lena! Your writing is so evocative and beautiful! I wish I could draw for you but alas I must do this instead

The original post can be found here!

Translation note: due to a silly mistake of mine, the original “crack” somehow became “holds”

Translation:

the road is long, the forest dim

his thoughts dance circles in the grows

his brothers, friends ahead of him

the sea, green waves and hidden coves

his gooseflesh rises; bush-birds take flight

trees chatter, crack, abruptly still

her shadow covers up the light

eerie and sharp; white-hot, blue-chill

her voice is fair, her voice is old

a song of bloom, a song of rot

her cat-eyes mirror dark and bold

and if that mirror shows him not,

only another, silver-crowned,

what fool would leave — what fool be found?

[ruiniel]

Hi there!

I'm a newbie in the tolkien works, I've finished off the hobbit and the lotr books but have no idea where to go next. I've looked at different websites about it but I haven't gotten any clear answers. There's like a million of these books and I feel so lost!

I figured that as a long time fan that you'd know the answers to this question if it's not too much of a bother.

Thanks in advance no pressure!

Augh, anon! This is one of the best things to ask of someone with a lifelong interest in this universe.

I WILL get back to you on this, but.

Was thinking (midnight brain) could we make it a group effort? It feels as though seeing different perspectives from other people in the fandom would be of help here, and since I do want this covered I'm calling on mutuals and followers in the Tolkien fandom.

Please if you deem, I do encourage people to add to this.

Let me try tagging (there are legit so many of us): @arofili @actual-bill-potts @eveningalchemist @goschatewabn @cuarthol @melestasflight @thelordofgifs @outofangband @thegreatstrongbow @potatoobsessed999 @hennethgalad @jamcake-muses @i-did-not-mean-to @glorf1ndel @z-h-i-e @verecunda @naryaflame @mirkwood-hr-department @saurons-pr-department @welcomingdisaster @hirazuki @nuredhel @effervescentdragon @searchingforserendipity25 @cilil @hhimring @chrissystriped @yuzukimist @edensrose @awesome-bluehair-universe @swanmaids @herinke @celebbun @auntieaugury @auroramama @puelhathnofury @kiatheinsomniac @eilinelsghost @asianbutnotjapanese @i-gwarth @batsyforyou @aprilertuileviresse @fishing4stars @elamarth-calmagol @zeladanial @silmarillionwritersguild @silmarillionno @solmarillion @samarqqand @sallysavestheday+ anyone else and ALL the Tolkien visual artists who see this and I forgot to mention (love you all, so many) if you have the inclination to add your journey/experience/recommendations? Anything, we have a good topic here.

[swanmaids]

Tagged by @bretwalda-lamnguin to make a poll of my favourite characters from different Tolkien canons, thank you!

Tagging @meadowlarkx @imakemywings @polutrope @thelordofgifs @welcomingdisaster @elevenelvenswords @mircallaruthven @mirillel to do this if you’d like!

[eilinelsghost]

WIP Wordsday

Thanks to @sallysavestheday for the tag! Here’s a bit from the next Atandil of Gildor and Balan talking about their shared experience of being orphans while on the road after parting from Finrod & co at the borders of Doriath:

“I have been angry now for many years.” Gildor’s voice held all the bitterness Balan dared not utter, and he shuddered to feel it resonate through his bones. “Others I knew lost one parent or the other on the ice, but how could both have gone from me at once? Did one spirit feel the other’s departure and follow for love of it? Did mine, lingering in the exile they chose, bear no staying weight?”

Balan’s heart blenched and he shifted in the saddle. This is the whim you choose above your sons? Above your duty? Estreth’s voice cut through his memory, sharp as the day he walked out through these same fields, and he felt a twinge of affinity with Inglor’s corpse upon the ice. If it lay within his power, would he not follow Nóm’s spirit too on whatever road it led? Would he remember to reckon first the tally of what he left?

Tagging @emyn-arnens, @welcomingdisaster, @thelordofgifs, @grey-gazania, and @that-angry-noldo if you’d like to share too

[thelordofgifs]

for some reason TFS /always/ shows up on my dash RIGHT as i have to leave for work, so i, very foolishly, read about half of it before i had to rush out the door and was in horrible suspense the whole time. i am holding this against you but AHHHH. maedhros giving up control is SO interesting in this fic. maedhros despair response: control freak about it. maedhros EXTRA HORRIBLE despair response: nothing matters and i'm letting someone else (first curufin and now fingon) take the reins. love this AHH maglor letting go of the secret so quickly!! this will certainly fuck up the way curufin feels about being in this family LMAO... also maglor waking up alone,, i was half-expecting the hunting knife to be bloody. very curious to see where it goes from here, because it has consistently not gone the way i expect it to

I’m sorry about the suspense pls forgive me ❤️❤️ anyway yes Maedhros and passivity!! is so interesting to me!! Also also. Celegorm got to fight a werewolf with his hands and teeth and Curufin got to ruin literally everything for no reason and Maglor… was Maglor but MAEDHROS SHOULD GET TO BE DRAMATIC TOO SOMETIMES. LET HIM BURN DOWN HIS OWN FORTRESS AND THEN SEND AWAY ALL HIS FOLLOWERS. HE HAS HAD A REALLY BAD FEW WEEKS AND HE DESERVES IT.

Maglor! He started out that whole conversation thinking “I am going to be gentle and understanding with my grieving little brother” but Curufin did absolutely cross the line and Maglor lost his temper (starting to realise I love writing Maglor losing his temper?? he’s such a drama queen about it but his dialogue can be SO vicious). Curufin was like “wait fuck people love me I have no idea how to deal with this”. But on a practical level it was not very sensible of Maglor to reveal the secret! And he is now feeling guilty for having (in his mind) lost Curufin. As for the waking up alone I was ABSOLUTELY thinking of your Curufin kills Maglor theory with that lol. But the poor boy deserves a break from being a pincushion.

Sidenote, actually: people can (and have, in the notes) interpret this in different ways, but I see Curufin’s decision to run away as a very morally neutral one. He does feel terribly guilty that Maglor is willing to die for him; he’s also not at all willing to die himself. In some ways it’s pretty cowardly of him to disappear – and he left his VERY BADLY INJURED brother pretty much completely defenceless except for one (1) knife, too. And that isn’t even getting into what he must have known the abandonment would do to Maglor emotionally! It was cruel and kind at once, in my opinion – very curvocore.

I am also very curious to see where it goes from here!! And my guess is only slightly better than yours actually.

[zealouswerewolfcollector]

WIP Whateverday

Tagged by @welcomingdisaster, thank you <3

I'm tagging @sallysavestheday, @amethysttribble, @quixoticanarchy, @grey-gazania

Haven't written for a while, tbh but before my break I was trying to write for a dark kinkmeme prompt. Got too sad, so I abandoned it :/

“Shall we take a walk?” Maedhros asks. Fingon hasn’t left the room since the day he came in. He refuses to count how long ago it was. Maedhros blocks Fingon’s ears with wax and puts the blindfold over his eyes. He puts cotton balls in Fingon’s nose, so the smells won’t give away their location. He picks Fingon up and takes him away. They are descending. Fingon puts his palm over Maedhros’s chest and counts his heartbeat instead of the stairs. The sun is warm upon his face. Fingon looks up until even under the blindfold his eyes begin to water. They are lying on the ground. Fingon is glad հe cannot guess where they are based on how the blades of grass feel between his fingers. Maedhros holds his hand. Maedhros cups his face. Maedhros kisses him.

Another tidbit under cut for implied sexual violence

“I was thinking of you when it happened,” Fingon says. “Perhaps that was why it happened.” There is no enjoyment for him in the way Maedhros’s face twists in a grimace of pain, which he tries unsuccessfully to turn into a smile as if it is a more appropriate reaction. “Beginner’s mistake,” Maedhros says finally, keeping his tone carefully light. “Did you not,” Fingon asks, “think of me?” Why did you not think of me? Why did you not come for me? Why do you love me less?

[searchingforserendipity25]

fern and moss and root and blossom

daeron/maglor / ao3. for @silmsmutweek.

many thanks to @welcomingdisaster for sharing her enthusiasm and betaing expertise <3

Daeron’s long exile had turned him into a strange creature. So closely aligned to the Music that he could quiet down the voice of the wind in the trees with a sweet phrase and the turn of his wrist, quiet the sound of the surf with the might of his minstrelsy. Maglor, it had become swiftly apparent when they met once more, found it entirely disarming to be disarmed.

“Ai,” Maglor said, mighty voice trembling with a sharp thrill of fear, pulling with his blackened hands at the ivy and vines that were Daeron’s grip, Daeron’s conquering claim. “Have pity, minstrel. Not all of us bear our horrors so conveniently arrayed.” 

His nostrils flared - there was nothing feigned about the shuddering of his voice.

“That is not a very charming entreaty at all, with no poetry to be gleaned in it. Do you know, I do not think I shall,” Daeron said mildly, and felt the taste of blood in the air a moment before Maglor bit his cheek not to laugh. 

Bound with his back to a great elm, Maglor tugged at the chains of ivy that curled around him and held him down. Daeron felt the swift galloping of his heart as closely as if he had pressed a palm against his back.

It was only half for the spectacle of it that he struggled, and the pleasure Daeron took in feeling his body move against his will and bound to it. There was always a true edge of terror in it for him, a fierce flare of defiant shame.

His face gleamed in the moonless dark, gray and thin and terrible; his eyes shone silver, covetous and fey amidst the shadowed wilderness that trapped him in Daeron’s hold. 

Daeron tightened the hold around his throat warningly for a moment. Maglor’s breathing grew stilted for a moment, strained, before he eased his shoulders, forced himself to yield. 

Bound mercilessly, legs spread open by ropes of hibiscus and honeysuckle, Maglor could not reach him.

But he was not careless - violence would not serve him here, and so he made himself gentle. Turned his hand carefully around Daeron’s ivies, tugged lightly only, stroked the edge of a leaf, hummed a soothing note when Daeron's wilderness quivered, curling around him tenderly. 

“It is not poetry I wish from you tonight,” Daeron said, sounding severe to his own ears. He was not inclined to making it an easy victory for himself, nor an easy surrender for Maglor: but he felt half-impish, scattering trickling thirstles around his ribs and forced him still. "Nor any song at all of your own words at all."

His bare feet on the grass sank down, and grew cold. The mist was gathering, growing restless around them - Maglor's dark curls turning shadow-dark, his panted breaths deep and deeper with a voice nothing like the voice of one of the Eldar. 

It had taken a long tutelage, but under Daeron’s instruction Maglor had learned at last to surrender to be free. His sighed against Daeron’s mouth, let himself sink into his grip. 

The first true attempt to free himself shackled him more firmly; the second earned him a raking scratch of fingertips wrapped in briars, the third came shattered, half-pleading.

And then Maglor went very still. A row of brambles wound itself around Maglor's wrists, dangerously near the burned ruin of his hands. 

"Monstrous," Daeron said disdainfully, pressing a long sliding touch of his hand to the place where elvish steel had left scars on his chest. Maglor's own, warped fingertips curled in reflex, and the pain of it stole his voice for a moment. 

Maglor shivered with unfeigned want. The shadows clustered around him shivered with him. Already a damp fog rose in the air, to smudge the edges of the world, leech its colours and deepen its echoes. 

Daeron stepped back, ignoring Maglor's cry. 

Soothing, Daeron’s tendrils stroked his arms, rustled over Maglor’s bare shoulders. Caught as he was, it was a sweet temptation to kiss him to silence; and there was little reason for Daeron not to indulge himself tonight. 

Daeron’s long exile had turned him into a strange creature, so closely aligned to the Music that he could quiet down the voice of the wind in the trees with a sweet phrase and the turn of his wrist, tame the wild calls of the gull and quiet the sound of the surf with the might his minstrelsy.

His wanderings through the ancient forests, and the dangerous studies in song he indulged in with no teacher or king or dear lady to bind him had changed him greatly, more than was quite righteous and good. 

Maglor, it had become swiftly apparent when they met once more, found it entirely disarming to be disarmed. 

A game of nearness and glancing touches, control and grace. Maglor's voice rose and fell under Daeron's caresses. 

On moonless nights, when the stars were brighter in the sky, Elbereth's light clearer and purer, and Maglor was flushed and feverish, skin prickling with a faint burning - when Daeron's hold over the rhythm and melodies of the desolate wild places was most potent, then they met, only then. 

Daeron had missed the salt of Maglor's blood, had grown hungry for the delicate feeling of his pulse fluttering under his power. 

It did not happen every new moon, not even every year; the course of their exiles did not always intersect on those days, for they each held to their own domains, the duty they owed their grief and their lore. 

The vines he bore as part of himself only retracted back to their winding ways around his arms almost reluctantly. More and more often, Daeron stretched the moments to a sweet interlude, reveling in the heady feeling of his lover's pulse resonating from vine to skin to his own cock, before he willed himself to unshackle him.

 They were fond of Maglor's skin, ever-hungry, and willful, whimsically led by Daeron's stray, misplaced instincts. 

 To want to release - not to watch mesmerized his possessing strength, where the living instruments of his song curled, tight and tender and terrible, around Maglor’s yielding. 

They had agreed on it - moonless nights were for wildness, the darkest night of each year given over to the strangeness, pain and regret, grief and sorrow had made of them. 

Maglor gasped. Daeron’s fingers wound about his hair, tight and punishing; but he did not need them to stroke him. He pressed close against his buttocks, already slick with sweet nectar. 

Now, he did permit himself to smile. Maglor's charred hands were shadow and flesh at once, struggling against his might one last time, before he grew weary and wary and wise enough to pause, breathless under Daeron’s attention.

"I shall do better," Maglor protested,  a little desperate. "Will not any poetry at all serve? Let me please you, lord; I shall show you such images of glory you have not known before, and such a sweet ache of grief you will weep and be glad for it."

"I have no ears for your tales and lays, your bespelling treachery that traps the unwise in its riptide."

"Not even a joyful hymn? I would give you such a thing, as it is in my power."

"Nay," said Daeron dryly "not even that."

Maglor tilted his head back against the tree, rubbed his cheek against a heavy front of thick leafs. Looked at him under the startling darkness of his lashes, a rousing sight on any occasion, and rarely more than when Daeron could feel his shuddering veins, the rasping of air on his throat.

"You have not heard this one before, master: it speaks of lovers that meet only in the dark, and part in sorrow to meet again and torment each other before falling into an embrace."

"Nay," Daeron said, amused despite himself and striving to be dire, "not even that! Treacherous thing that you are, changeful and terrible, I would court foolishness to permit you the power of any narrative." 

Tendrils of mist curled around his legs, fluttered adoringly about his wreath of living ferns - a smell of the sea was in them, the ceaseless lust of the sea, dreadful and unnatural and dear to him. Daeron had grown strange and powerful in his exile, but so had Maglor, on most nights but for this one.

His hands of bark and amber ached to stroke the curve of Maglor’s cheek, the thin skin of his neck.

Half of his was his own want: half of it was Maglor's compelling will, tugging light and teasing. A reminder of his mighty power, diminished for tonight; and a slyer reminder, too, of other encounters, when it was Daeron that walked on moonlit hours by the shore, allowing himself to be enthralled by a spell sung over and with the whispers of the surf.

Daeron, too, had missed him; but tonight, Daeron did not soften, kept his rose-briars sharp as knives, his shielding walls of growth high as a siege around Maglor. He stepped back, and all the leaves of his dark forest rustled a song of longing in echo or his refusal. 

The rising shadows of Maglor's haunting draped themselves heavy and sweet about his shoulders, sunk gladly into the earth he claimed, tangled around his thistles - that much he did welcome. Always the darkness in him was easier to tame; all the rest was words and wind, proud grief to be pared down and horror to be matched by horror. 

"A touch, at least," Maglor said, voice rumbling, control fraying - the sea's waves and surf, the sea's own hunger speaking in and through and with his voice. "Have pity! I have missed you so, singer."

Daeron folded his hands, very nearly like the hands of the Eldar, and mightier by far, to watch Maglor's eyes on them lose their false Treelight, grow dark and dark through and through.

Nothing of Elvenkind remained in him, but for the memory of grief he clung to; if his strangeness was less visible at first than Daeron's, it was not because it was less absolute, and certainly it was far more hideous. 

Daeron was the forest, the trees, the grass and the soil. His power rose in him, unrestrained - all his flowers blooming, the leaves speaking in leaf-tongues, the torn sinking deep and drawing blood. 

He felt the rushing force of Maglor's fear in the air as the sea-chill, heady as a kiss. Satisfaction settled tight and warm in his spine already; but he meant to be patient.

There was no space for pretense between them. That was a lesson to be relearned every time, and Daeron meant to enjoy upholding it as well as ever he had. 

“Sing to me sweetly enough, perhaps, and I might consider releasing you after I have had my fill,” Daeron said, and reached out through the mist to gather the shadows close and tender about his chin. "But make it beautiful. I am of a mind for beautiful things, tonight."