CWËNIZ .

Motionless, resembling a monument hewn from marble more than ever, Thranduil stood at as courteous as comfortable distance.    His own attention momentarily pinned to the fabric — how it gently swayed upon receiving curiosity’s touch through a stranger’s fingertips.    Rooted in what twilight filled this chamber, MOONLIT strands kissed by faintest tinge of gold, the elf allowed for a lackadaisical smile to replace flawless nonchalance.    ❝  For the better  ❞,  poured that slice of repetition forth in tones audibly skeptical.

There was reason behind that.    None the ELVENKING rushed to lay bare just yet, for Morgana’s unexpected laughter stirred in him a breeze of irritation which tilted his crowned head a tad.

Her further confession posed another revelation that suffocated an any grain of speech otherwise escaping his mouth in response.      She must have been lonely for a tremendously long time.    ❝  You have come to gather answers to your visions.  The only one here whose forgiveness you need has to be yourself ….  ❞    And he gestured for one of the waiting servants to prepare the table with some food and drink,  ❝  … for I doubt it makes any difference to me if you find those answers or fail  ❞,  ere aiming for one of the chairs to halt behind it.

In fluid motion, one richly adorned hand pointed toward a seat across from the one he had picked for himself.    Expectation that his soundless suggestion be heeded lifting prominent brows, alow which STEELY eyes averted from his guest in no moment.    ❝  This would be the best imaginable opportunity to collect practise, then.  We will begin with something simple  ❞,  the sound of wood grating along stone sent a swiftly fading echo up into the heights.    For those chambers all might seem smaller than the great hall, the walls but were all reaching for the sky.

❝  You said you bear hope for this world to continue and change for the better.  What meaning does that term hold from that perspective of yours ?  Better.  ❞    A servant returned to place a wooden platter on the table’s center;  it carried a glass bottle filled with spring water and two glasses.    Thranduil thanked them with a subtle nod.    Returning the gesture, that same servant exited swiftly.    ❝  The definitions thereof vary as do the lives roaming our world.  ❞

𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐀 𝐌𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓 𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐑𝐓 𝐅𝐀𝐈𝐋𝐄𝐃 𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐍 𝐇𝐄𝐑,   and she had begun to wonder...    had she a right to inflict her questions upon so noble a person for her own benefit?    she shuddered to think that she should fail, and that all would be for nowt, or that she should lay her head back down upon when she made her bed within the wilderness with nothing but doubt to fill her head.                NO.   she had every right.   she who had toiled through for years through the dark,  who had seen the emptiness of the human soil.  she would make no apology for seeking the answers she deserved.   still, tempestuous turmoil shown sharply in every crease around her eyes, though feet did carry her to the end of the table where she sat as directed, though with no small amount of nervousness. 

where she hoped to smile at him and alleviate some of her own trepidations, she found only the deepening lines on her face.   how confusing he was, electing her to practice, as if she were speaking to a common man off the beaten path between one city and the next.   what would she do if her answers were not satisfactory?   if they failed to miss their mark or worse, if they offended him?   he might as well have been staring down at her with a ghastly grin wrinkled on his lips and a gaze filled with fire. 

but it mattered not, did it?   she made it here.   she had.   and not a damned person could take that from her. 

then she looked on him, and every ounce of callous preparation seemed to fade from eyes to lips into an expression of practiced calm.      ❛   better   ❜,    the young woman echoed again, tasting it as it rolled on the back of her tongue, on the tips of her teeth.    ❛   the meaning i propose would be: the propensity not for progress, but for kindness.  for the world needs nothing if not more of it between one man and the next.   ❜

she hid her hands in her lap and straightened her posture when servant made their hasty exit, and anxiety set back into her eyes.   she sat perfectly still, fingers wound tight around one another to pull on hempen rings, and scanned him for any break in his demeanor; any little clue that would tell her if she had said the right thing or not. 

❝  Flattery   implies   that   I   am   mistaking   you   for   someone   ordinary,   which   isn’t   the   case. ❞   Well,   well,   part   of   secret   remained   secret   then… Good   enough   for  him.  Pacing   his   way   to   the   nearby   wall,   hands   moved   behind   his   back   before   Eligos   leaned   against   it.   Why   give   any   more   reason   for   doubt   or   wariness ?

❝  I   have   no   need   for   divination   or   for   acquiring   a   woman   who   catches   my  eye,  I   am   much   more   interested   in   the   source   of   them.  Call   it   boredom   or   scientific   curiosity,   either   would   be   truth.  ❞

𝐄𝐘𝐄𝐒  𝐌𝐎𝐕𝐄  𝐅𝐑𝐎𝐌  𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐇  𝐓𝐎  man, and in them stood the white atomic fury of the queen of air and shadow.   lips part with the ferocity of the panther,  and despite the pride of her powerful stature come shining through with fervor,  the crow woman sits a little taller with no crown upon her head.      

             𝐄𝐍𝐃𝐔𝐑𝐄 .        is that not what he has been doing his entire life ?    from the moment he could walk ( or perhaps even before ? ) til now .    every second has been a trial of endurance .      𝐈𝐓 𝐂𝐀𝐍 𝐁𝐄 𝐓𝐈𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐆 .    he shifts his weight in his seat ,    old wood creaking with the slight of his movements .

             ❝     i’m done with enduring .❞           he answers – not spitefully ,    though his words may suggest otherwise .       𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄 𝐈𝐒 𝐒𝐎𝐌𝐄 𝐕𝐄𝐍𝐎𝐌 𝐈𝐍 𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐕𝐎𝐈𝐂𝐄 .    but it’s most certainly not aimed at her .      ❝     why must we wait and do nothing ?     we have the power to act .❞ 

𝐇𝐄  𝐈𝐒  𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐘  𝐁𝐈𝐓  𝐀  𝐒𝐎𝐍  𝐎𝐅  𝐓𝐇𝐄  𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐃𝐋𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐒.    ready to don his iron armor and go riding into battle.   morgana’s lips curled into a furtive sneer, for she could not deny that he had waited, that he had suffered, and that she understood his hasty desire for swift and just revenge more than any ever could.   tome is set aside in favor of attending her young nephew,  headstrong mordred,  who she drew up behind with a scoff in her mouth.  

—— SOMETHING  IN  THE  air  shifts;  whispers  of  the  ancients  that  once  walked  wood  ‘pon  the  wind,  as  soul  becomes  ever  so  slightly  disquieted  in  presence  of  she  (  aura  one  of  mystery,  of  something  archaic  &  reverent  ). gaze  falls  upon  noble  steed,  noting  its  calmness  at  timbre,  lips  curving  into  faint  smile. 

then  it  shifts  to  woman,  emerald  hues  wavering  before  falling  to  earthen  ground.  “throughout.  i  am  on…a  leave  from  my  profession.”  much  needed,  after  all  man  had  ENDURED  (  glad  to  be  away  from  heat  &  sand  of  caribbean;  of  woman  that  had  broken  his  heart  ).  “no  —  merely  entered  to  escape  from  the  others  on  holiday.”  and  once  more  does  gaze  lift,  sincere  &  earnest.  “i  did  not  mean  any  ill  will  towards  you.”

❛   𝐍𝐎𝐑  𝐃𝐈𝐃  𝐈  𝐒𝐀𝐘  𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐓  𝐘𝐎𝐔  𝐃𝐈𝐃.   ❜     toneless words scorched the tender skin of frostbitten lips, and the tension around them grew stiff and cold.   the lady’s fingers curled about her soiled skirts so that she could walk carefully through the mud, until she had come close enough for him to smell the smoke of burned incense clinging to her hair.   there she knelt along a patch of mostly-dry grass and began to pick up the kindling that had fallen, piling each heavy twig in the crook of her arm, as one would hold a child.  those cold eyes cast themselves up at him, as if squinting toward the canopy of a much-too-tall tree.     ❛   at least make yourself useful.   ❜

done with permission from @tharanduil​ / inspired by them, i decided to make a post about fanon tropes present on this site vs my own original portrayal.   /  TRIGGER WARNING:  topics include historic xenophobia, intolerance and brief mentions of sexual assault.   

DO NOT REBLOG. DO NOT !!!   THIS IS A ROLEPLAY BLOG AND MY HEADCANONS ARE NOT UP FOR DEBATE.

morgana as an entity, or morgan of the faye, is linked heavily to the goddess matrona of celtic mythology, and also to a goddess specifically known for the ulster cycle as of her involvement in la morte de arthur,  written in 1470.   while i will have a much, much longer headcanon dealing with her link to matrona, especially being that the same deity was linked to be a protector of modron,  or mordred....     i specifically wanted to talk about her similarities with the another goddess of irish mythology known as the morrigan. the goddess is more of a primordial force than a ‘god’ by conventional means, and is known more by her moniker ‘the phantom queen’. while she is linked heavily to the outcome of battle and bloody war, rather than being wholly associated with the actual fighting of a battle, she has more to do with the fate of those in and after a clash and the gruesome deaths that follow. but instead of acting as a means to transport someone to the afterlife,  they were simply a symbol of death on the battlefield to some lesser extend.  

A huge part of the Tuatha de Danann, the Morrigan was also known to have been made up of three distinct goddesses known mostly today as the maiden, the mother and the crone. All of which have a link to Morgana in one of the many stages of her life and to goddesses such as Ceredwen,

The morrigan would often appear in the form of a black crow, which happens to be morgana’s symbolic familiar, and upon seeing one on the battlefield it was believed to mean that death would befall that person imminently. this aspect of the morrigan made her popular for worship by those going into battle. interestingly, in most forms of media that portray morgana, this also links to her being used as an instrument of war, offering her services to the queens and kings of the north in exchange for shelter and safety, or for troops to fight of camelot and the rest of growing mercia.

but the morrigan also has in-depth protective qualities that enable her to protect her people. namely those who were worshipers of these ancestral gods and practitioners of magic, which also directly aligns with morgana’s personal interests. morgana le faye was a symbol to most practitioners of witchcraft and druidism of this time as a pariah that fought against the Anglicization of what would become albion. remember that at the time of her life (presumed to be around the timeperiods of 400-600 ad, respectively) it was when the heavy Catholicisation of what is now great britain, had begun. uther pendragon, and later the knights of the round, had pushed those that they had deemed uncivilized (magic-users) into areas in and north/west of lothian, gaelic and pictish lands.  

BECAUSE OF THIS, TOO,  morgana can be seen as a protector of those who were like her, especially if we bring popular canon such as bbc’s merlin into view, which i take some inspiration from in terms of magic being ‘outlawed’ at the time through penalty of death. fighting against the oppression of pagan ritualistic practitioners all over briton,  as well as the druids of the dal riata alike, she was turned into a martyr of sorts and later demonized to the point of gaining a status of ‘evil’ ...  while the kings who had oppressed or slaughtered these people (particularly the druids, like uther pendragon or his son in historic canon, not in the case of bbc) were instead built of as heroes to the people of albion for ridding them of the ‘evil’ pagans that had previously (as termed by uther) ‘infested’ their lands. propoganda against them surmounted and the britons and anglo-saxons continued their territory war, until separately the battle of camlann occured              [ where king arthur had lead his knights of the round table into a war that would have claimed most of the northern territory in the name of camelot against the anglo-saxons, which had currently belonged to several albic tribes including that which belonged at the time to his nephew, gwaine of loth. ]

almost ironically, this battle is what enabled the bernicians to take even more land for themselves, creating the kingdom of deira (which, in my canon is what pushed morgana even further north of lothian, into the lands of the gaels). the reason i bring up this battle is because the morrigan is famous for taking part in the battle against the fomorians. the  morrigan did naught at first but speak in chant, which caused the fomorians to scatter in fear until they fell into the seas.

another story she is involved in is that of Cú Chulainn, who threatens the morrigan when she releases his cattle back into the wild, only to realize who he has angered and explain his misdeed. when the morrigan prophecies ill-tidings for him on behalf of his threat, he tells her that she has no power over him. as we would expect,  Cú Chulainn is given numerous chances to mend the relationship with the morrigan and botches it every time, eventually leading him to his inevitable death with the morrigan, as a crow, standing atop his dead body as a means to confirm his death. interestingly, morgana was also present at the battle of camlann, which i mentioned earlier, when both her nephew and her half-brother (mordred and king arthur) were slain by a single blow from one another’s enchanted blades.

      Every   once   in   a   while   there   were   those   who   would   not   be   as   easily   fooled   by   visage,  having   knowledge  —   or   perhaps   instinct    —   above   the   rest   of   their   kind,   and   thousand   times   more   interesting… He   saw   it   in   her   expression,   not   charmed   nor   curious,   but   so   was   to   be   expected,   otherwise   her   name   wouldn’t   be   known   even   below.   Eligos   offered  a   wide   smile,   a   silent   admission   of   guilt   as   couple   steps   shortened   the   distance   between   them.  ❝  You   value   truthfulness   and   purpose   above   impression?   Wise   of   you.  ❞

❛    𝐅𝐋𝐀𝐓𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐘  𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐋  𝐆𝐄𝐓  𝐘𝐎𝐔  𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐘𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄  𝐀𝐍𝐃  𝐍𝐎𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄  all at once.   or didn’t you know?   ❜    folding frail hands atop her knees, her pale gaze slid from his odd, if not worrying countenance to be intrigued by the fire instead.   it was warm, and from the hollow roar of black smoke racing up the chimney one could assume that the top logs were fresh and dry.