I don't actually remember the full context of how that started, but it was some joke on the SWG discord about Morgoth as the original Russingon antishipper, and just grew and spun out from it into an increasingly silly crackfic. I shared a snippet of it with Corvid, who came up with the phrase, because that's what Morg is behaving like. :D

Thanks for the ask! This is my fic about Emeldir leading the women of Dorthonion through Nan Dungortheb that I've been working on for—oh lord—two years now. I'd get farther on it if I didn't keep rewriting it.

Here's a little bit of Emeldir and her daughter:

“How does your leg fare?” Emeldir asked quietly. Hiril had been born with one leg shorter than the other. When she was young, Barahir had fashioned a shoe for her with a higher heel that would make her legs equal, and he had remade it every time she outgrew her shoes. It was a helpful aid, but walking for long periods pained her, though she complained little of it. The shoe was also, Emeldir thought, allowing herself to dip briefly into the well of her grief, one of the last tokens of him they would have. “Well enough,” said Hiril, massaging her calf. “I will feel better after I have rested.”  Hiril had always been strong of heart, emerging from the womb red-faced and squalling, legs and arms pumping against the cold grip of winter, and later walking with the same intensity of purpose as Beren had after her, though every step pained her.  In kinder years, Emeldir thought, looking at the grim lines of determination etched in her daughter’s face, she would have made a fine lady of her people—steady, fair, and generous. But instead they fled their home and all they held dear, driven like thieves into the wild, hunted like robbers, pursued at every turn.

🤡 What's a line, scene, or exchange you've written that made you laugh?

😈 Has there been a point in a story where you did something just to be playfully mean to your readers?

🤲 Would you please share a snippet of a wip?

omg thank you <33333333

🎢 Which of your fics would you call your wildest ride?

Hmmm. Multiple people have said rules of betrayal was completely unpredictable to them, BUT, I think for ME its going to be a toss up between sisyphus (everything happens so much) and philomela (i NEED to write chapter 4 in which everything happens so much more than its already happened).

😈 Has there been a point in a story where you did something just to be playfully mean to your readers?

I already answered this here, and now I'm starting to think maybe I'm too nice bc I haven't really been mean except for one (1) time 🤔

🤡 What's a line, scene, or exchange you've written that made you laugh?

Already answered once here. But also I crack up every single time I reread Curufin and his wife in rules of betrayal mutually taking time out of their power play in chapter 3 to salivate over Finrod's fat cock. Something about the phrase and Finrod's incredible embarrassment just makes me giggle.

🤲 Would you please share a snippet of a wip?

Here's a little bit of Maedhros & Maglor going knives out with each other in the TRSB fic (mildly edited for reasons You Will See):

Maedhros took malicious aim. “Better an honourable salt-bitch than a dishonourable, sweet-singing cuckoo, who, when its treacherous, cowardly song is done, takes the crown for its own. That’s why you left me in Angamando, wasn’t it?” But Maglor had always been the more vicious of the two of them. Unlike Maedhros, who wielded his power with the careless entitlement of his estate, Maglor shied away from it. Maglor would wait until the balances tipped, until in his peculiar world of right and wrong, it was time to right all the wrongs. He smiled with gentle, feigned pity and then landed his blow with cool and unsentimental precision. “I might be a coward,” said Maglor, “but at least I’m no thrall of Morgoth.”

I just had to tell you this is so inspired. I think you could pull it off, but regardless I agree Would Read. Tell us more...? If you wish.

Thanks! I keep putting it in the TRSB suggestions list, but so far nothing :D

If I wrote it, I'd write about Maedhros building Himring and rebuilding himself at the same time. Putting a bit of his defiance, his stubbornness, his will to live into its stones. Building it as a shield and feeling possessive over it like a lover. They are intertwined. The connection is tangible, almost physical. Losing it after the Nirnaeth is akin to losing a limb, which Maedhros is more than familiar with.

Orcs give it a wide berth even after it's conquered because Maedhros's white fire still burns in its stones.

Himring lives even after Beleriand dies. It's derelict, barely a few stones remain from it, but it lives. It preserves the best that Maedhros had, though Maedhros himself loses it and falls into despair.

Hi friend! Thank you for the ask!

2. a character whose POV you’re currently exploring

I answered this once already, but let's pick a different one! I'm writing several things at once and on the backburner is a spooky Maedhros story about him not(?) finding Elurin and Elured. It won't be ready for Halloween, I don't think, but I have enjoyed this glimpse into his psyche right after the Second Kinslaying.

7. your preferred writing fonts

I'm obsessed with this question. I'm not sure I've ever noticed fonts outside of Scrivener. But I suppose I'll have to look. On Scrivener I use Literata which is a mostly free Google font - check the license part etc. For LibreOffice, I use "LiberationSerif" apparently; I believe this is the default. I also use whatever font discord is in because that's what I type snippets into when I'm on the go/I woke up at 3am and had to write the skeleton plot of a fix-it for Mirdania (despite her unfortunate name, I will protect her).

30. share a fic you’re especially proud of

I'm absurdly proud of Where now all our sons? It's a fic that hops between the POVs of Anairë, Eärwen, and Findis as they sail for Beleriand and endure the War of Wrath with the armies of Valinor. I loved writing it. Even though it's more work to breathe life into characters that don't have much more about them than their names in canon, I think it's worth it to people the Legendarium with more women of varied kinds.

Thank you so much for asking <3

@polutrope

It wasn't really upsetting, just annoying and honestly a little bit funny. This guy left comments on all six chapters of By Love or at Least Free Will, every time I updated the story, just objecting to the entire premise of the story and ranting about how Elves have incorruptible pure souls and are immune to lust. I was sorely tempted to respond with this quote from "Laws & Customs Among the Eldar":

Even when in after days, as the histories reveal, many of the Eldar in Middle-earth became corrupted, and their hearts darkened by the shadow that lies upon Arda, seldom is any tale told of deeds of lust among them.

'Seldom' is not the same thing as 'never', and furthermore, I don't think lust is even a major theme of my story. It's more about conflicting obligations and unruly hearts.

In the end I deleted the comments without responding, because I have a personal policy of not engaging with people who are acting in bad faith. But I have to assume that this guy has no actual hobbies if he spends his time hate-reading entire stories instead of just...closing the window and moving on with his life. Maybe take up crochet, bro? Or volunteer at a soup kitchen? Watch a TV show that you like? Grow some tomatoes? Do something that will be more fulfilling than typing long screeds on AO3. I promise it will make you a happier person.

Anyway. On to the actual topic of your ask! As you've probably noticed, I am very fond of Russingon. However, I am also very fond of Fingon as Gil-galad's father. At first I balanced these two ideas by keeping my Russingon ideas and my Fingon-father-of-Gil-galad ideas in two separate universes, but then I started really fleshing out Gil-galad's mother, and it made me think some thoughts. To repeat something I said to @cuarthol in a comment on AO3:

...half the genesis of Ianneth was seeing so many stories (in multiple fandoms, not just Tolkien) where the woman is written out of a canon or semi-canon couple to make room for a popular M/M ship instead, without the female character being treated with any respect. I decided that the female perspective on that situation would be a nice change of pace and interesting to write.

I'm not trying to point fingers -- I'll readily admit that I have my male faves just like the next gal and that it's fun to make them kiss -- but the wives and girlfriends don't get a lot of love in fandom, do they? And it doesn't help that the legendarium in general tends to be a bit of a sausage fest. So I decided that Fingon would have a wife and be in love with Maedhros. But instead of focusing just on the forbidden love, I was going to focus on the wife's feelings, too.

Ianneth ("bridge-woman") is one of the Northern Sindar, from the community that lives around Lake Mithrim. She's the daughter of Annael (yes, that Annael), whom I've imagined to be one of the more influential leaders among the Northern Sindar, and particularly among the Elves of Mithrim.

Her betrothal to Fingon starts as a political arrangement. Fingolfin loves Fingon dearly, of course, but he's also been hinting for a while now that Fingon really needs to settle down and start having kids so that there will be a strong line of heirs should Fingolfin die. After all, Argon's dead, and Turgon and Aredhel abruptly fucked off to god-knows-where some three hundred years ago and haven't been seen nor heard from since. Your dad needs some grandsons, Fingon, and this also seems like a ripe opportunity to strengthen the Noldor's alliance with the Northern Sindar.

I don't think political marriage is unknown among the Elves of Beleriand. (For one example in the text, see Celegorm trying to marry Luthien to force Doriath into an alliance.) And the quote I drew the title of the aforementioned Fingon/Ianneth story from, also found in "Laws and Customs Among the Eldar," is:

The Eldar wedded only once in life, and for love or at the least by free will upon either part.

Free will could easily mean, "Are we in love? No. But I'll still marry you, for the good of our peoples, and I'll bring some of Dad's soldiers along with me." That sort of thing happened all the time among real-world nobility, so I see no reason why it can't happen among Elven nobility in Beleriand, too.

At any rate, Fingolfin arranges for Fingon to meet the daughters of some of the more powerful leaders of the Northern Sindar, and he's hint-hint-hinting that Fingon really needs to pick one of them to be his wife. Fingon, having been in love with Maedhros since they were young in Valinor, is not exactly keen on this plan. But he goes along with it anyway because he is a dutiful son, he knows that his father is right about needing to strengthen the line of succession, and he also knows that revealing his (quite taboo!) relationship with Maedhros to his father would probably break Fingolfin's heart.

It takes Fingon a while to decide who to court, but he picks Ianneth because he likes her sense of humor; she has the guts to gently tease him at their first meeting, which he finds quite charming. He doesn't think he can love anyone besides Maedhros, but he does look at Ianneth and think, "This is a woman I could grow to care for and whose companionship I think could enjoy."

The trouble begins when, over the course of their courtship, Fingon starts falling in love with Ianneth without falling out of love with Maedhros. And he doesn't know what to do about this. He can't call off the marriage, and he doesn't want to break things off with Maedhros, so he decides to just...keep the whole thing with Maedhros a secret and marry Ianneth anyway. It's not a good decision, but really, are there any options here that won't end with someone getting hurt? I don't think so.

So we have Ianneth, blissfully ignorant of her husband's infidelity (for now); Fingon, in love with two people at once and feeling horribly guilty about it, but unwilling to pick one partner over the other; and Maedhros, resigned to the situation but still hurting because Fingon is no longer his alone.

Maedhros' feelings are complicated by the fact that, once he meets her, he finds that likes Ianneth. It would be easier, he thinks, if he could write her off as just a political necessity for Fingon, but it turns out that she's charming and intelligent and kind, and he can understand why Fingon loves her. His feelings soften further once Ereiniel is born, because Fingon is so happy being a father, and he loves Fingon, so how can he begrudge him that? There's a line from "Famous Blue Raincoat" by Leonard Cohen that I always think of when I'm getting into Maedhros' head at this point:

And thanks for the trouble you took from [his] eyes. I thought it was there for good, so I never tried.

Things tick along about as smoothly as they can for thirteen years, until, in the aftermath of Fingolfin's death during the Dagor Bragollach, as Fingon prepares to send Ianneth and Ereiniel to the Falas for their safety, Ianneth learns his secret. This is understandably devastating for her, and leaves her wondering if Fingon ever really loved her as she loved him, or if his marriage to her was simply a politically expedient sham.

Add to that the fact that she leaves for the Falas less than ten hours after this revelation and spends most of that ten hours either crying or asleep, as she's too upset to really talk to Fingon about what she's discovered, and it leaves her with this horrible knowledge and all the worst thoughts that come from it gnawing at her nearly a full year until Fingon next comes to Eglarest -- time that she spends as the sole caregiver for her young daughter, among strangers in a foreign city, without her mother or her sister or any of her friends who might have theoretically been able to offer her some emotional support.

Theoretically is a key word there, though, because even if, say, her sister had come to Eglarest, Ianneth isn't sure she'd even be able to tell her. For one thing, she can't help feeling ashamed, because infidelity is very rare among Elves, and she can't help thinking that maybe she failed as a wife somehow, and if she'd done something different, Fingon wouldn't have strayed. Then there's the fact that he's the High King of the Noldor, and if this gets out it could cause a crisis in the Noldorin government and possibly tank the alliance between the House of Fingolfin and the Northern Sindar. Ianneth is a practical woman, and she's of the Northern Sindar -- the people who have been living practically on Morgoth's doorstep for centuries, with no Maia queen's magic girdle to protect them. Their alliance with the Noldor is vital, and she would never want to jeopardize it.

Elves poured out of the palace-fortress that was Menegroth, into the woods that the queen’s magic had made safe again. They were deep and green and dark, starlight trickling faintly down through furled leaves that had never seen another kind of light. The Elves sang, Daeron’s hands flew upon her pipes, and the wood grew more beautiful. Trees grew new bark over the scars made by enemy weapons. Moss covered bones that sank calmly into the thick loam, vanishing forever. Thingol wore the great sword Aranrúth and spoke still of danger, but it was danger’s absence that many felt, for the first time in this land complete and wonderful.

Daeron had her study back, which had briefly been converted into a storehouse for maps and missives. She drew pen to ink and then to paper and began again with a poem set to the notes of a zither. Thingol and Melian laughed and drew into each other’s arms in the beech grove when she played it, as though reeled by a thread.

There was only one restless soul in this new paradise.

“Come away with me,” Lúthien whispered as Daeron packed up her instrument.

✨ for Elwing

(Unusual headcanons ask game)

💖 - Romantic relationships or ships. (This could be as simple as sharing a rareship you enjoy, or an unusual interpretation of a popular/canon ship!)

I mean just saying I usually don't care for Russingon counts as unusual around here. But in all seriousness, dude is almost too asexual to function. No time for fucking when there's Thangorodrim to glare at.

✨ - Worldbuilding or background story elements.

She—she was three years old, terrified out of her mind, she almost certainly generated a false memory after the fact, the timing shouldn't have worked, she knows this— but when she was being carried out of Doriath through the woods, bundled against Evranin as tight as possible to not let any hint of the Light she carried escape, she thought, just for a moment, that she saw two small figures watching them.