Elthbe - Senza Titolo

Nerdanel, strong Nerdanel, young and curious. She travels alone throughout Valinor, to the edges of the light of the Trees. She sleeps on the fields under the stars, she eats what the land offers. She follows streams and wild beasts, she collects rocks and takes notes of the different types of mineral and stone, her drawings filling the pages of the little notebook she carries with her. She goes on foot, and her legs get strong and quick. She ascends the peaks, where the snow crunches under her boots, and running water carves shapes into the rock. She is on the summit of the Pelori, where the air is thinner and cold, and she can see the plains of Valinor stretch underneath her. She wonders if this is what Manwe feels like, if he feels the same exhilaration that she expereiences in her bones. She reaches the sea, she swims with the dolphins and imagines to fly with the seagulls, and her eyes are drawn to the dark sky far in the east. She wonders what had the Elves in Cuivenen seen, how they had lived in the dark, the stars their only guide. She feels observed, a kind presence that watches over her, and the stars look a little brighter as her voice raises in song to Varda. She stays there, at the fringes of the territories of the Eldar, mourning in her heart the day that she has to return home, under the bright light of the Trees - beautiful, but the stars are not as bright as they are here. She would like to take their light with her, to preserve that gentle and distant beauty. But she has to return at some point, she cannot wander forever.

One day, as she is making her way back home under the light of the Trees, she meets an ellon. He is tall and dark, but when he looks at her, his eyes shine brighter than Varda's creations. And Nerdanel knows that she will keep starlight with her forever.

Morwen and Hurin

Here’s a sketch of Maedhros from my work-in-progress fanfic about the Ambarussar starting a religion. Mae hasn’t heard from the twins in years, so he goes to check on them. He soon starts to feel severely overdressed when he arrives at the twins’ isolated ascetic cult community where everyone wears the same brown tunic (he has zero clue what he’s walking into.)

I aim to draw the twins next but alas they will be less sexy since they are quite emaciated, especially Amrod

A5 paper, markers, took about three hours

Thingol hating on Maedhros is so crazy hilarious to me because imagine beefing with your bestfriend's grandson

wdym i can't hug that guy that hangs on that mountain on his one hand? he's just a little girl

"A king is he that can hold his own, or else his title is vain" says Maedhros and it reveals something interesting about how he sees kinship and his role as leader.

A king is he that does not delegate and when wants something done, goes himself. He leads by example, he negotiates (attempts to, at least) with Morgoth, he places himself at the northern border of Beleriand, and the text tells us that he is even "very willing" that Morgoth's force falls heavier on him. He is ever watchful, he goes personally into battle, and is at the frontline, doing deeds of surpassing valour.

And when he is king no more, when Himring has fallen, and what little hope they had of defeating Morogth has vanished, he has his oath. He loathes what the oath makes him do, this the text says plainly, but the fact remains that he does it all the same.

He clings to the oath, terrified of what could happen if he breaks it. In his last conversation with Maglor, he appears to be more concerned to be an oathbreaker, than anything else, convinced that the doom of an oathbreaker is worse than that of a kinslayer. Because a king that breaks his oaths, is no king at all.

He is trapped in the condrum that the 'heroic' mentality poses. Until the bitter end. When faced with the very fact that the oath was void, his entire worldview, his certainties crumble, and his life has no meaning anymore.

I don’t think Maedhros stopped praying when he left Valinor, even once the Valar had forsaken his family and banished them. Maybe it was habit maybe it was comfort but I don’t think he stopped.

Nor do I think he stopped when he was captured by The Enemy. I think it became his sole source of hope that someone who cared would hear him and free him one way or the other and in a sense that prayer was answered.

I don’t even think it stopped when Fingon died. I think Maedhros prayed he’d find peace and safety in Mandos. I think he prayed he’d be home safe soon. I think he was grateful that no matter the end the person he loved most was at last out of harms way.

No he stopped praying after Doriath. The night he lost so much. The night he lost three brothers. The night that Celegorm bled out in his arms going out of the world quietly, in stark contrast to how he entered it. But it was not those deaths that stopped his prayers, he knew his brother’s wrongs, the harm they’d done. He knew with as much pain as it brought him they deserved it.

He stopped praying when he lost two little boys in the woods. When in desperation with tears freezing on his cheeks he called out with the simplest prayer you can “please.” He was met only with the bite of the frost and the cold moonlight and the colder indifference of gods that claimed to be loving. When Fingon had reached out in a moment of need despite his own banishment an eagle had been sent. To save Maedhros’ wind and war torn soul. But when Maedhros asked them to save two little princes lost in the woods there was only silence and contempt.

Yes I think he only stopped praying after that. When he was good and sure he was alone.

man i wish romance was real and not just something Tolkien made up for his books

jrr tolkien: I write literally every kind of character jrrt: this is Beren, he's a wifeguy jrrt: Tom Bombadil, a total mystery but also a wifeguy jrrt: Treebeard, former wifeguy jrrt: Samwise Gamgee, future wifeguy jrrt:... jrrt: Turin Turambar, wifeguy gone terribly wrong

At some point in the third age

Galadriel: I am the last member of the house of finwë on these shores. My brothers, my cousins, my uncles; everyone who came here with me is long gone. I am my family's last survivor.

Meanwhile Maglor on the shore:

Galadriel: Sometimes I can still here their voices