#edgeoflight

a tender love, a gentle touch

Finrod deserved better than this, he knew. But so did Turukáno—so did Elenwë.

a treat for @edgeoflight as part of the Smut Swap 2021!

Rating: E | No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Finrod/Turgon Characters: Finrod, Turgon Word count: 1.3k

1. Pick a character who does not appear in either The Lord of the Rings or the published Silmarillion, and elaborate on their backstory.

Lalwen!

I don’t have much of a backstory for her childhood– this is really a prompt that’s better suited for a fic (which I’m not writing because I don’t have the time)– but I do think she survived Beleriand and returned to Aman after the War of Wrath. She took up leadership on Tol Eressëa and ruled as queen there. Furthermore, I think it took until Beleriand for her to realize that she’s attracted solely to women. And as a final tidbit, she wears a pixie cut after the First Age, both because she loves it and as a visible break from tradition.

10. Pick a character or group who you believe is unappreciated, undervalued, or undeservedly reviled by fandom and explain why they are awesome.  

Indis.

A lot of the stuff that makes her awesome is buried in HoME, but… she’s not a dainty little stepmother who did nothing worthwhile. I mean, really. There’s a large difference between in-universe bias from a character and fandom basically going, “Fëanor is 100% right about everything, including hating his stepmother who did nothing wrong except marry his father.”

I understand that the fear of being replaced is a normal reaction from a child… but Míriel was dead and not returning. How is any of this Indis’ fault?

(Of course, it doesn’t help that narrator of the Silm is also critical of the decision to remarry.)

She raised two awesome sons, two HoME-canon daughters, must have helped the Noldor in Aman recover from the Darkening because it seemed none of the other leadership stayed (at least until Finarfin returned), had her own interests (music and running). She seems to have had a cheerful personality and a sense of humor (chiefly the line from HoME X: “and there was ever light and mirth about her while the bliss of Aman endured”).

When or if I started shipping it:This is my second-oldest ship after some combination of Celebrian/Elrond/Gil-galad so...like 2003 probably?

My thoughts:I’m not even sure what to say because it all just turns into “MY BOYS” and inarticulate flailing.

What makes me happy about them:Shared history. A deep understanding of one another. A good excuse for the psychic twins trope.

What makes me sad about them:Guilt, moral quandaries, the tension between wanting to be together and wanting to be honest with, and close with, the rest of their family

Things done in art/fic that annoys me:We don’t have time for the full spiel but some highlights...

Weak twin/strong twin trope

One is the Dumb Jock and the other is the History Nerd

One soul two bodies

One is ALWAYS guilty and reluctant, the other is always pushing, to the point that it skirts dubcon

Evil Elrond finds out and tears the family apart over it

Things I look for in art/fic:In art, honestly, anything, I am a sucker for it. In fic--stuff that treats them as individuals (but individuals strongly influenced by one another!), stuff that focuses on their bond, stuff that uses the guilt/fear of being found out as a bit of tension rather than a Major Melodramatic Plot. Also stuff that avoids all the things mentioned above.

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: Hnnngh. Mostly nobody? I guess technically my OCs, kind of, so Elladan/Gustav and Elrohir/Leofric, but even then I ain’t happy about it.

My happily ever after for them:They come to terms with secrecy, figure out how to make it work, sail West after Arwen’s death but still carve out a place for themselves in Valinor that’s not just in Elrond’s house or as Elrond’s sons. Stay close to their family, but not TOO close.

@edgeoflight, @lunarymagic, and @nimium-amatrix-ingenii-sui tagged me in this aaaaages ago. I am finally doing it! Rules: list ten of your favourite female characters in different fandoms and then tag ten people 

I’m not tagging anyone because I’m late late late, but if anyone wants do to this feel free to steal it!

1. The Lord of the Rings -  Éowyn. I’d have to say  Éowyn. Right now I’m on a Galadriel kick and I adore Goldberry too, but I keep on coming back to Éowyn because she’s such a great character and I love her a lot. I love that she remains unbowed, her desperation not to be left behind, her desire to fight, just everything about her. (She resonated a lot with bb!me, let me tell you. At 12 I was basically in love with Éowyn. (And I still am, honestly.))

2. The Silmarillion -  Oh, fuck, this is difficult. Aredhel, maybe, because I love that, from what we see of her, she’s headstrong and stubborn and knows her own mind. Or maybe Indis? I love Indis, and there’s so little of her, but I’m so interested in what kind of person she is (because she went against years and years of custom and tradition and that takes strength and stubbornness). Or Morwen, who, again, I love for her strength and resolve and her bitterness and pride (and the fact that even in defeat she was apparently terrifying as fuck). Or Ungoliant, who is a mystery I really want to solve, and I love what we get of her in HoME even more. She’s such nebulous evil, not purposeful evil, content to just be evil and not burn down the world (except to get to the light, of course), and that’s weirdly fascinating. But if I have to choose, I’d say Aredhel. (This is a very difficult choice help.)

3. Hamilton - Eliza. (I’m sorry, Renée. I love Angelica, I do! But Eliza won by just a little.) Pippa’s vocals are just gorgeous (the way she just says ‘you, you, you’, anger and hurt and condemnation and so many other things), and she really really can act and she’s my absolute fave (why yes I adore her why do you ask). And Eliza is very interesting. I don’t quite have a firm grasp on her character yet, but I love her resolve and her steel, and I love her growth and change through the musical.

4. Agent Carter - Peggy Carter. I love her strength and stubbornness (why yes this is a pattern), and I love that she got the ‘no, you move’ quote because it’s perfect for her (and increased my Steve/Peggy feels x10000 they are perfect for each other). I love her kicking ass and taking names and being ridiculously competent and her EVERYONE I LOVE DIES angst and her foeyay with Dottie (hothothot) and Hayley Atwell is just such a perfect Peggy and I love Peggy Carter a ridiculous amount and I may even get that tattooed on me.

5. Avatar: The Last Airbender - I’d usually say Katara, but these days I’m also increasingly falling in love with Azula. I love them both for how unmoving and uncompromising they are (why yes I do have a type why do you ask), but I also love that Katara doesn’t break but Azula does. I love Azula’s manipulation and fucked-upness and how even when she genuinely cares for people she shows it in a really, really messed up way, but I also love Katara’s idealism and open-heartedness and the active choice she makes to do the right thing. (And the fact that both of them are ultra-competent and ultra-powerful is also great.) I would say, for this fandom, that it’s a tie. YOU CAN’T MAKE ME CHOOSE.

6. Marvel Cinematic Universe - Natasha Romanov. I love Nat’s chameleon-like qualities and how she will do anything to survive (well, almost anything; I also love how CW showed that when push comes to the shove, she’ll choose her friends above surviving or even her own happiness and safety. I love ScarJo’s deadpan delivery and Nat’s quirky sense of humour. I love her dark past and her reform and the fact that she’s still atoning for her past, and I also love how damn dangerous she is. I just love Natasha Romanov a lot okay? (Wanda came in a close second. Her fits of rage and anger are perfect, and I love that she’s an atoner figure too, and she’s, again, crazy powerful and dangerous. But I chose Nat in the end. Sorry Wanda.)

7. Harry Potter - Lately, I’ve been loving Amelia Bones. Honestly, my favourite Harry Potter character changes every few weeks so don’t expect this to last, but right now I love what we see of Madam Bones. Her work with the Order, the fact that she sticks fast to her principles and does the right thing even when she’s working with Fudge, her sheer competence, her last stand defiant to the last and the fact that she’s so powerful and made herself such a nuisance that Voldemort himself fought her...(yes, my id let me show you it).

8. DC Cinematic Universe - Diana. Hands down, no other choice but Diana. (I haven’t yet seen Justice League, but I really don’t expect anything to change.) She’s idealistic and strong and headstrong and a little bit naive. And she’s such a happy person in WW, so full of joy and surprise and wonder at so many things, and she’s also wonderfully compassionate and in general a lovely person. But she’s also really fucking powerful. Gal Gadot’s muscles are just...mhmmm. Lifting tanks, making ridiculously high leaps, hiding swords in the back of her dress...I love Diana of Themyscira a lot.

9. Legend of Korra - Korra herself. Again, I love her strength and her competence (but also the fact that it’s strength and competence she has to work for), and her sheer physicality and physical power. And I love that she’s at the center of basically everything and I love how naive she is at the beginning and how she slowly loses that naivety. And I love that she struggles and falls and breaks and she has to put herself together again, but I also love that she’s headstrong and stubborn and very much her own person.

10. Star Wars - Leia or Padmé. Can I say both? I’m just going to say both. I love, again, how stubborn and resolved and idealistic they are, and the sheer chutzpah they both have in facing down people who are far more powerful they are. I also love their idealism (though Leia’s is a more worldly idealism than  Padmé ‘s), and their willingness to do the right thing at whatever cost, and their devotion to their duty, and their political smarts. (Also, both of them have damn gorgeous wardrobes.)

Ahhhh this was you! I SUSPECTED but was not sure. :D

Ha, good point! I tend to think that Fëanor naming Maedhros Nelyafinwë wasn't about Fingolfin at all, the family dynamics then were completely different to what they later became, and he named him 'Third Finwë' because that's what he was, third in line. (I also tend to think Fingolfin was still a child when Maedhros was born, and Fëanor didn't consider him a rival, or indeed, consider him much at all, then.)

Yeah, that’s what I think too (”before strife was born” and all that).

Also we have no idea when the names were given - Fëanor went by Finwion for an unspecified period of time, and for all we know Fëanor named Maedhros Nelyafinwë after Maedhros had already spent some time in court doing what a prospective heir might do (Fëanor certainly had to wait for Canafinwë, Turcafinwë and Curufinwë to show that they were masterful, strong-in-body and skilled respectively before he could name them thus).

This post is part of Femslash Revolution’s I Am Femslash series, sharing voices of F/F creators from all walks of life. The views represented within are those of the author only.

I am, first and foremost, a fan of Middle-earth, of Tolkien’s work. (I’m a fan of a lot of other things too, but nothing quite like Tolkien’s world.) Over the years, I’ve heard a lot of people saying that the women in Middle-earth get short shrift, that there aren’t enough of them, and what few there are aren’t fully fleshed out but are more archetypes or stereotypes than real characters. The only woman in Middle-earth who we are really given the chance to identify with is Éowyn, and there aren’t even any women at all in The Hobbit! 

So, up against such difficulties, why is it that I feel so passionate about femslash in Middle-earth? 

It’s partly because it is such a challenge. There are layers of story-telling in Middle-earth, all the way from The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings to the vast rough drafts buried away in the 12-volume History of Middle-earth series, and in there, I’ve found inspirational nuggets of information that have set me wondering. And wondering leads to fleshing out these characters who are often very little more than names, developing backstories and motivation and meaning, secrets worlds within worlds that can be given voice in stories. 

There’s the story of Anairë, who stayed behind in Valinor when her whole family, husband, sons, daughter, travelled to Middle-earth, because of her ‘friendship’ with her sister-in-law, Eärwen. There’s the story of Nerdanel, who, when she left her husband, went to stay with her stepmother-in-law, Indis, rather than go back to her father’s household. 

There’s the story of Aerin, who, when her land was captured, was married by force to a man she hated, who defied him in secret, partly by giving food and other goods to Morwen, the widow of her relative. There’s the story of Finduilas, who in the narrative is captured and killed, but who in the world of AUs, might just manage to become a Elvenking with a mortal girlfriend, Niënor. 

There’s the story of Galadriel, who travelled to Middle-earth the long and hard way, to the Kingdom of Doriath, and there met a Queen, Melian, who became her teacher, and a Princess, Lúthien, who became her friend. There’s the story of Erendis, unloved wife, who lived in a household full of women, and raised her daughter there. 

There’s the tale of Tar-Míriel, the captive Queen who drowns when Númenor does – or does she? There’s Mithrellas and Nimrodel, separated by fate, but perhaps reunited. There’s the story of Lalwen, never mentioned in the Silmarillion, who like her brother Fingolfin, travelled across the Grinding Ice to Middle-earth, and who might have met a lady that she loved – or who might have left one behind.  

There’s Haleth and her Amazonian band of female guardswomen. There’s Andreth, who fell in love with an elf prince in her youth, but perhaps she consoled herself with a mortal woman later in life. There’s Ervanin and Gereth, on opposite sides of a battle, coming together to save the young princess Elwing. 

And there’s the Valié, effectively goddesses, and Maia, effectively lesser deities, who can take any form they choose and have power beyond reckoning, who might choose to love each other. There’s Aredhel, wild huntress who deserved a better fate, who can have it with any woman, mortal or Elf, in fanfic. There’s a world of original characters, characters who might be male or female, we just don’t know, characters who are not even mentioned except as concepts – mothers, sisters, daughters, soldiers, handmaidens, ruling queens, vampires, female Orcs, dwarves, Entwives. 

When you begin to look, you can see opportunities for femslash and for fleshing out female characters around every corner of Middle-earth. Yes, this is stuff Tolkien never would’ve thought of or been capable of, and that’s the point. This playground, this world of Middle-Earth, is ours now, and it’s up to us to choose what to put in it, what stories to tell. 

Love Middle-earth. Write femslash!

About the author: amyfortuna has been writing fic of all kinds in the Tolkien fandom since 1999 and will probably still be writing it forty years from now. They can be found @edgeoflight, or amyfortuna at dreamwidth, and also are responsible for @tolkienfemslashrecs, @innumerable-stars, and @silmread. 

crocordile replied to your post “AU proposition: Finrod beats the werewolf and lives. That's it....”

I'm sure Finrod Beren and Lúthien get to have at least one or two wonderfully ot3esque shippy scenes before his death in angband tho...? pleading eyes

beren sandwich plsss

idk why you’d save a Finrod from a werewolf dungeon and not have a threesome with him, that’d be ridiculous. 

simaethae replied to your post “AU proposition: Finrod beats the werewolf and lives. That's it....”

"Probably everyone dies some other dumb way though" did you mean: Turin

....yes. Yes I did. Maybe in this AU he dams the Narog or something. 

simaethae replied to your post “AU Thingol lives how do the murder bros go about regaining the...”

Dear Thingol, hope you're well. The weather here is terrible but I have killed a large number of orcs. My brothers send their [unintelligible, scribbled out several times]. Please give us the Silmaril. Yours sincerely, Maedhros Feanorion

It is uncanny, how did you get this out of my WIP folder the ruins of sunken Beleriand? 

imindhowwelayinjune replied to your post “AU proposition: Finrod beats the werewolf and lives. That's it....”

Honestly I am here for this even if none of it goes beyond the first sentence of the first bullet point

You just want C+C to be sad and incestuous in some woods somewhere, I know you. 

roadgoeson replied to your post “simaethae replied to your post “OKAY. AU where the noldor never go to...”

mad mags?

edgeoflight replied to your post “simaethae replied to your post “OKAY. AU where the noldor never go to...”

Okay I need a Mad Max AU right now. Clearly Emeldir is Furiosa!

valaraukars replied to your post “simaethae replied to your post “OKAY. AU where the noldor never go to...”

omfg shut the hell up mad max AU how dare you!!! (mad maglor in tattered leather jackets is... 150% what I'm about) I need beyond thunderdome and I need 'two elves enter one elf leaves' but it's a sing-off!! aunty entity is a galadriel who never left Middle Earth and rules her little realm with an iron fist. some vague abuse of nenya, maybe

Clearly there is a need in this fandom that’s not being met. Do not, my friends, become addicted to post-apocalyptic AUs. They will take hold of you, and you will resent their absence!

imindhowwelayinjune replied to your post “AU Thingol lives how do the murder bros go about regaining the...”

What an incredibly functional bunch! They all have such good ideas! WHAT COULD GO WRONG

Who let them out unsupervised?

erotetica replied to your post you please write a fingon lives au where he and mae kill each...”

Fingon 'I want you to know this was only a quasi mercy killing' Nolofinwion fucks me up. Shit, son, sit DOWN.

Right, just so we’re clear? Fingon would have won, even if Mae hadn’t let him. It’s all very sad but we do need to be clear on this. 

noxious-mau replied to your post “can   you please write a fingon lives au where he and mae kill each...”

I just woke up and the girst thing I read is DEATH. ~cries~

okay but it was a death that made the recipient very happy?

thearrogantemu replied to your post “can   you please write a fingon lives au where he and mae kill each...”

w h y. (also, welp, agreed on the 'not as tragic as canon' bandwagon, though poor Fingon, my goodness.)

cycas replied to your post “can   you please write a fingon lives au where he and mae kill each...”

Very very sad, but I'm with imindhowwelayinjune - not as tragic as in canon