for the @officialtolkiensecretsanta 2022 event!

"Rushlight" [AO3 Link]

Rating: G

Warnings: None

Relationships: Elros&Maglor, Elrond&Maedhros

Tags: Amon Ereb, First Age, War of Wrath, Winer Solstice, Candlelight, Slice of Life, In Locomotor Parentis

(tol-himling)

YES, okay, @tol-himling so this is... touched upon in the Three Queens AU, but not in any great detail and I love Anaire and Fingolfin FAAAAAR too much for me to abandon the hc to die there, so- it turned into a mini-story, I guess!!!

...

It’s one of their oldest traditions- Fingolfin wakes early and washes his hair in rosewater, and brushes it out in time for Anaire to wake; she readies herself for the day while he looks over some of the treatises submitted the night before, and then, when his hair is dry, Anaire spends a good quarter of an hour braiding it with all the accoutrements that Fingolfin’s accumulated over the centuries.

They split apart for the rest of the day- they tend to look over separate spheres, Anaire more of the administrative side; Fingolfin more of the conflict-mediation side- and only get back together at night, when Anaire takes out Fingolfin’s braids and they fall asleep together.

...

There is a reason why Fingolfin does not touch his own hair.

...

That reason is that- well, whatever a black thumb is to a gardener, Fingolfin’s hands are to hair.

...

He cannot. He cannot. 

People think Anaire doesn’t braid her hair with many jewels because she doesn’t care about society. The truth is two-fold; her hair is brittle enough that it can’t handle the weight of too many jewels, and she also doesn’t have time what with having to deal with her husband’s overly-elaborate hairdo every single morning.

...

When Finwe dies, Fingolfin doesn’t have time to wait for Anaire to undo his braids; he tries doing them himself, and tangles them so badly that she has to take a knife to the ends, and plait it up tight enough that nobody notices.

...

And then Fingolfin leaves, and Anaire stays.

...

On the Ice it doesn’t matter; he pulls on a hood and doesn’t bother with it. The ice has frozen it solid anyways. And how is Fingolfin supposed to let anyone else deal with it? Anaire had done his braids. She had done them, and he misses her, and it does not matter if she is not there and never will be there, and it certainly does not matter that he does not know- that he is not capable- of doing them himself. 

There are people literally being eaten by seals. He’ll deal with his hair issues later.

...

The braids don’t thaw out of the ice until the Sun comes up. Fingolfin, by then, is soaked in his youngest son’s blood, and doesn’t quite care about anything else. Not, that is, until Fingon goes missing, and he is abruptly reminded of everything else that he stands to lose.

So he gets to work. Takes control of the place. Ties his hair back with knots of twine, and ignores it right up until Fingon’s back, Maedhros has offered him a crown, and the coronation is literally within a few hours.

And then he calls Turgon in. Turgon had been the one to braid Elenwe’s hair- he’d inherited Anaire’s brittleness and clever fingers- and though he is more used to the Vanya style, he is better than nothing, isn’t he?

Fingolfin, very quietly, folds away every memory he ever remembers, and asks his darling son to braid his hair for him. Turgon does; he, too, has lost a wife- and he does not laugh about it as Fingon might have, and he is not impatient as Aredhel might be. It settles both of them. The braids are fine things, even if they are not quite so elaborate as Anaire might have managed. Neither of them cry, which is the important bit.

...

A little more than a hundred years later, Turgon disappears.

...

Fingolfin takes to wearing twine around his hair, or letting it free. It is a banner in its own right: a black so deep it might be blue, whipping in Hithlum’s fierce winds. Nobody touches it. His people whisper, sometimes, that he will not braid it again until Morgoth’s blood waters it. Fingolfin does not contradict them: it will take Morgoth’s death to bring Turgon back, and he will not have braids until then, and so they are not wrong, even if they think him far more vengeful than he is.

...

And then- fire.

...

And fury.

...

Thanks for the ask :D

4. Going shopping for formalwear (ranked most to least helpful)

Finrod - He has a plan from the get go. Probably knows what he's looking for in the first place but gets distracted by other stuff easily. Still the one who probably puts together the best looking outfit (might be on the expensive side though)

Fingolfin - Sooo we go in, buy really good looking clothes because he has an eye for it, pay an ungodly amount of his money and leave, thing solved in less than half an hour not because he dislkies shopping (he loves it trust me) but because I dislike it and he doesn't want me to feel bad.

Thuringwethil - This woman probably has a great sense for fashion but I'm not sure how comfortable I would be with her accompanying me. She would still be a better help then the next two

Nerdanel - Probably just as fast as Fingolfin BUT both her and me are not happy with our situation because shopping is a nightmare and shopping for formalwear even more so. We would probably videocall Fëanor half way through and get fashion tips or something

Aragorn - Imagine him and me standing there in the section for formalwear in the clothing store and having absolutely no clue what to do. Not saying that Aragorn has no fashion sense but Elrond and Arwen probably put together most of his wardrobe. We would probably mess around a lot, forget the time and have like nothing bought by the time Arwen comes to pick us up and then she will have to help us.

Far too much to say, especially for writing on my phone but oh well here ya go! Very good food for thought, thank you :)

I love Maglor!  I think in some ways, he is not as flashy as the other disaster brothers, so it can be easy to forget about him.  However, I am experiencing a Maglor renaissance right now!

the rest is below a cut because it got Really Long.

Note: the text in all the images has been copied into the image description function on desktop. let me know if for some reason it can't be accessed.

Anyway, cosmic-walkers and I had a really good exchange about maeglin and his treatment in text that got me thinking again about eol and the difficulties I've had engaging with his narrative even after coming around to a more nuanced.

I mentioned this in my tags and asked how folks go about repairing eol's narrative:

And I got a really thoughtful reply that, with permission, I'm sharing here so that more people can see it. Hopefully it is as interesting to you all as it was to me. (browse images right to left, top to bottom. comments organized in vertical order in each image).

Thank you @cosmic-walkers for taking the time to write that out for me. It absolutely makes sense, and I actually really love getting long messages because I feel like the length constraints of both tags and comments hinder free conversation.

Thank you @cosmic-walkers for taking the time to write that out for me. It absolutely makes sense, and I actually really love getting long messages because I feel like the length constraints of both tags and comments hinder free conversation.

I have a degree in public health, and my focus was interpersonal and family violence; I don't bring it up to toot my own horn, but rather to offer some context for readers here and to draw from as I analyze the patterns of behavior in the narrative.  For what its worth, I think that more nuanced readings of eol's character line up pretty well with frameworks for understanding unhealthy relationships, abusive relationships, and family violence.

I think it makes people uncomfortable to engage with the idea that abusers are humans.  I don't mean that people ought to feel a preponderance of sympathy for them (at the expense of their victims), but rather that humans have human triggers, motivations, and psychologies.  Of course, we are talking about elves, but *vague hand waving.*  I joke that my degree was the most expensive, circuitous way to get therapy, but it really did help to engage with concepts like family systems theory to understand my own life and move forward in healing past "that sucked and my abuser is a monster .... who somehow manages to treat everyone else well... why me?"

Family systems theory posits that abuse can arise in certain dynamics and be conducted by people who, in other dynamics, would not act abusively.  It asks us to describe both the overarching family system as well as the subsystems that exist between different members.  Noise in one subsystem echoes to impact the rest of the system.  It emphasizes the impact of boundaries (divisions, openness or isolation, emotional closeness), roles (patterns of behavior, and who may be targeted/blamed/scapegoated), rules (spoken and unspoken standards, traditions, and guidelines), and hierarchy (power, who holds it, respect and lack thereof).  People chafe against the the last concept, feedback and circular causality, because when applied incorrectly it can sound like the victims are provoking their own abuse - this is not true, and it should not be applied like this.  It only means that a relationship yields certain behaviors depending on its climate, and that once a pattern of behavior is established it becomes harder to break. 

When analyzing family systems theory, many people choose to pair it with the family resilience model, which prioritizes repairing the broken aspects of (sub)system relationships, hilighing positive characteristics and using them as strengths to propel other behavior change, and promoting flexibility, openness, and equitability of social and economic resources to stabilize (sub)systems to begin the healing process.  Of course, not everyone wishes to remain in contact with their abuser.  Of my two abusers, one I have cut contact with and the other I now have a healthy relationship with.  But, utilizing models and evidence based practice like this is critical to actually understanding and then remediating abuse and its damage.   

Edit 1/1/23: I forgot to mention the impact of stress on abuse. Many abusers release their stress, confusion, and concerns in the form of abuse because they don’t have another way to process and positively direct those emotions. This can be caused by lack of emotional intelligence or ability to self regulate and soothe, lacking interpersonal communication skills, poor modeling from their own role models. I’ve written evidence-based program plans for mitigating teen dating violence, and to make an impact you have to far in advance of the common age of onset of dating violence. We should be teaching stress management tools, emotional regulation, communication skills, and bodily autonomy is late primary and early elementary school. But many people connect dating violence and sex in their minds and don’t want to talk about it with kids. In reality, a lot of abuse happens because of disregulation, not because of inappropriate desire. This is compounded in real life by theories of power and hierarchical respect - if people feel like someone is of higher value than them, they treat them respectfully, but if they feel like they are the person of higher value, they feel it is within their rights (and perhaps a just affirmation/ defense of system hierarchy) to treat them as they please.

I bring all this up because after reading your comments, I tried using it to analyze the system of Eol, Aredhel, and Maeglin, and the subsystems between them.  We agree that as a whole, their family system is tense, unequal, and prone to violence (not necessarily the physical kind). Edit 1/1/23: everyone in the family is experiencing stressors, including Eol himself. The way he responds to these stressors is not healthy and has an impact on the subsystems of their family.

The subsystem of Aredhel and Maeglin is the easiest to analyze in some ways, and there's a wealth of knowledge to pick over.  The two of them are emotionally close, open with each other, ally with each other (as in, we do not canonically see either of them display pecking order behavior in which one abuse victim then abuses someone less powerful in another subsystem), and seem to have similar power distance (aredhel is his mother, but she is not characterized as being domineering toward him, and has about as much systemic power as maeglin in comparison to eol, though eol treats maeglin worse initially, forming a subsystem I discuss next).  

Eol and Maeglin form a fractious subsystem.  It is characterized by high power distance, emotional isolation (see: not naming Maeglin until he was far along in childhood), and Eol regards him more as a possession than as someone worthy of his respect and basic dignity (see: the attempted murder).  Resources is a more uniquely human concept, but Eol is the lord of Nan Elmoth, he exerts some control over the forest, he maintains his own staff and people, and he has the ability to forbid (and enforce) certain behaviors.  Maeglin spends more time with his mother than father (out of the house too, if memory serves, though this may not be so odd for elves) and dreams of running away to Gondolin, and it seems to me that Aredhel's tales of Gondolin (ironically, a city-prison of another sort) are so sweet to him because of his current family situation.  

Aredhel and Eol form the third and final subsystem.  I think it is important to note here that many, if not most, abusive relationships begin well.  At baseline, many abusers are adept at concealing red flag behaviors until they successfully lock down their victim.  But I am more interested in exploring the family systems model of abuse here (Eol is often analyzed using the characteristics of a serial abuser, and while some people fit that model, in combination with the terrible handling of race and culture in this arc, brute caricatures, and white damsels, I think it does more to reinforce an over-done reading that leans into rather than away from Tolkien's biases).  

As you so rightly mention, Aredhel and Eol begin their relationship with a certain degree of love.  We can see some differences in power, agency, and respect from the start - I am reminded of Eol enchanting the woods to draw Aredhel in.  However, this is a storytelling device common to fairy tales, even ones intended to be read romantically, and because I am a huge lover of the Ballad of Tam Lin I must be honest with myself and admit that this alone can be taken as a stylistic choice and not an indicator of purely evil intentions.  

The difference in power only grows as Eol forbids Aredhel to visit the lands of the Noldor; this puts her in a difficult bind, as she is also not welcome in the largest kingdom of the Sindar.  In general, controlling someone's movements indicates a paternalism and lack of respect that it's difficult to build a healthy relationship on.  Now, initially they do go about exploring together, and I think this is something that would have endeared Eol to Aredhel, something she would have enjoyed, something they could have found common ground in, and something that perhaps reminded her of old friends like Celegorm.  As their relationship degrades, we see mentions of that closeness, emotional openness, and equity of station disappear.  Now Eol goes about his business, Aredhel concerns herself with their son, and they wait until Eol is gone to flee.

On the topic of why people agree to the demands of abusive or otherwise toxic partners, when interviewed many people say that they would like to stay with their partner but that they just want the abuse/hurtful behavior to stop.  Now, it's not always possible to achieve that, but many people love their abusers. They make excuses to themselves, their families, and to the medical and legal system to protect them.  We cannot discount the impact fear, threats, isolation, and lack of resources have on this behavior, but it would be wrong to dismiss the emotional attachment many people feel.  I believe this is a valid reason why Aredhel would initially entertain Eol's demand that she not travel in noldor lands (additionally, she has only had experience with her brother at this point, and Turgon eventually relented and let her go, so perhaps she thinks she can eventually wear Eol down into relaxing his restrictions).  It would also explain why she pleads twice to save Eol's life. 

Now, I think their relationship, even before Maeglin was (lovingly) conceived, was poised to fall apart.  Eol cannot get past his opinions of the noldor, and while those opinions are not incorrect and are, on their own, valid to hold, he marries a noldor woman and has a half-noldor child with her.  I think a certain lack of trust in Aredhel, and lack of respect for her cultural background, lays the foundation for his abuse of their son.  I read some excellent meta recently about the functional impact of the Quenya ban, and the writer posed that by banning Quenya, the language and culture was associated with kinslayers - thusly, anyone who wanted to participate in political life in Beleriand (which required peace and intergroup co-operation) would have to disavow not just the kinslayings (despite being overwhelmingly kinslayers themselves) but also there heritage.  I can see this kind of mentality come out strongly in Eol's treatment of Maeglin: he is concerned that Aredhel teaching Maeglin about her family is like a poison to him, that any faith he has in his wife's good nature or his own ability to parent effectively and teach Maeglin about his own culture is overwhelmed by the canker of noldorin culture.  

I think this further corroborates your claim that their relationship slowly degrades from good to bad, because I don't think Aredhel would have tolerated that initially, and if we follow LaCE I'm not sure conceiving Maeglin would be possible with the degree of animosity we see toward the end of their relationship.  But I might push a little on the idea that the relationship between Aredhel and Eol was healthy up until the birth of Maeglin.  I think the introduction of Maeglin to the family, the creation of two new subsystems, the shift and echo of power within the system, all combine to catalyze abuse.  But a loving relationship does not equal a healthy relationship, and loving and being loved by someone does not mean that you have a true, deep respect for each other.  It is fully possible to be in love with someone, care deeply about them - and be unable to relate meaningfully to them, or understand their fears or needs. This is how I perceive Aredhel and Eol's relationship almost up until the moment she flees from him.

Now I have some loose end thoughts.  Regarding the impact of Eol's parenting on Maeglin, there is some interesting research on chronic fear in children that I refer to now.  Chronic (prolonged, or recurring) fear in children causes a host of acute and chronic issues later, both physiological and psychological.  Blood sugar, stress hormone levels, sleep health, capacity for and strength of emotional attachment, attention span, short and long term memory, sociability and antisocial behaviors, and rage are all negatively impacted by experiencing chronic fear.  Fear is a word that has certain connotations in people's minds, but in this context it can mean anything from living in a war zone, to experiencing abuse, to being bullied or growing up being discriminated against for any reason, to being food or housing insecure, to being routinely disciplined in an illogical/punitive manner.  Not all sources of fear are imminent physical threats (there is a reason it is a separate and unique felony crime, for example, for a child to witness abuse taking place even if the child is technically safe).  

So we can look at all this and apply this to how we think Maeglin thinks, feels, and interacts with the world considering his poor relationship with his father, the disintegrating relationship between his father and mother, his introduction to gondolin (and losing both parents), and then the discrimination he faces within Gondolin.  He moves from one system of fear to another system of fear, and the irony is that his father couldn't stand him for his mother's heritage and the Gondolindhrim judge him for his father's.  I think in some ways, Nan Elmoth and Gondolin are reflections of each other, and what happens when xenophobia, isolationism, and fear come into play.

Something else that came to mind while writing was that different groups of Sindar view the Noldor differently. Doriath views them as a challenger to the rule of Beleriand, and this is evident in how Thingol speaks of his kingship and the laws he makes.  Some Sindar go with Turgon to Gondolin - though the ruling class, and the historians like Penlodh are all Noldor, so while Maeglin was not entirely alone in Gondolin, he still was not truly free, and the historical record after his death is most definitely biased.  the Sindar in the north see the Noldor as allies - though again, similarly to the Sindar that took Turgon as their Lord, or the Edain immediately swearing to elvish Lords, I see Tolkien's bias and racial hierarchy creeping in here to determine "logical" progressions of events.  I think all of this contributes to a very tense environment in Beleriand, between the noldor and the sindar, between different groups of sindar, etc etc, and different groups would likely have different fears/reactions to the Noldor.  I think Eol was poised, with his cultural trauma, for his marriage to fail.  And he is mentioned in connection to Thingol, not Círdan, so his cultural and political context comes into play here.  Additionally, we have no idea how old he is.  Thingol (and Círdan too iirc) is old enough to remember the Teleri that left for Valinor; this is speculation, but Eol could be as well, which would at least contextualize his intense reaction to the kinslayings as an even more personal grief. 

This was a very long free-form way of processing what I think about Eol, and I think I can safely say I find him more interesting as a character now.  I really wanted to like him! I tried so hard! I can find something to like about almost every character in the legendarium (even if it's just a "wow that is such an interesting/stimulating way to build characterization").  And I think I can do that with Eol now.  I think there's so much to explore re: Nan Elmoth, his skill as a smith, and his relationship with the dwarves.  

I actually think it was you that posted about Feanor and Eol being similar, and the thought crossed my mind again as I was writing this up, firstly because of their similar passions, but also because I think they respond to stress, fear, and grief in a similar way.  Neither of them handle it well, and they take it out on the people around them.  In fact, I think it's great to contrast these two.  On the one hand, we have Feanor, grieving his mother, his father, the last bit of stability in Valinor, and feeling like he doesn't belong in that society, that he's tainted, and that everyone secretly hates him (Morgoth's brain worms aren't helping).  On the other hand, we have Eol, who is grieving the murder of his kinsfolk, and who views the arrival of the noldor as the colonization and the potential obliteration of his people (a valid fear to have, and corroborated by those princes of the noldor who cross the sea not to fight Morgoth but to obtain kingdoms of their own).  And of course, the threat of imprisonment in Gondolin for life is the last straw, and very important in my mind when considering what Eol does next.  

It just came to mind, but you could perhaps draw a parallel between Eol trying to kill Maeglin as a perverse mercy killing to spare him the pain of being an outcast in Gondolin, and Denethor trying to burn himself and Faramir alive to prevent their remains from falling into the hands of the Enemy.  Eol has a certain love for his son, and unfortunately it's the killing kind.  

Again, I really appreciate you taking the time to talk with me, and I'm in agreement with you!  It was really helpful to hear your thoughts.  In a way, it was kind of freeing to hear you say Eol was kind of crap?  The last conversation I had (years ago) with someone about Eol and transformative works, I got the distinct sense that they thought anything less than a fully exculpatory reading of Eol (and reworking the narrative to place the blame of Aredhel's death on "an accident" or "getting between Turgon's men and Eol") was not good enough to repair the narrative.  And don't get me wrong! I actually really enjoy AUs and canon divergence, and this arc is no exception!  

But sometimes I like to stick closer to canon, and pick apart the biases in the narrative and how they're impacting the characters, especially in an arc that is tied so closely to those characters.  I had a pretty firm grasp of the biases at play, but I didn't have as good a handle on the dynamic between Eol and Aredhel and that really tripped me up when I considered possible adaptations to their arc.

my @myslashyvalentine fic for @jouissants

"The Room Where They Do What They Don't Confess" [AO3 Link]

Warnings: none

Rating: E

Words: ~4400

Pairing: Fingolfin/Maglor

Characters: Fingolfin, Maglor

Tags: Beleriand, Mithrim, First Age, Grief/Mourning, Politics and Family Feuds, Oral Sex, Anal Sex, Uncle/Nephew Incest, Transmasculine Author

Summary:

"Nolofinwë looked up at him, and his gaze pierced him.  Kanafinwë read in his eyes all his anger and all his hurt, which he had nursed all these long years and which had kept him warm at night.  Perhaps he read confusion too: that he had come all this way to treat only with ghosts, for Fëanáro was dead, and their pact along with him.  Kanafinwë himself felt like a ghost, though he yet lived."

My submission for the 2022 @officialtolkiensecretsanta event, for @jaz-the-bard! I hope you have as much fun reading this as I did writing it!

"Under That Burning Ether" [AO3 Link]

Rating: E

Warnings: Major Character Death

Words: 7000

Relationships: Idril/Tuor, Idril/Maeglin, Tuor/Maeglin, Idril/Tuor/Maeglin

Characters: Idril, Tuor, Maeglin, Turgon

Tags:

Fairy Tale Retellings, Daughters of Ys AU, Gondolin, Magic, Trans Male Character, Trans Maeglin, Oral Sex, Fingering, Vaginal Sex, Anal Sex, Strap-Ons, Transmasculine Author

Summary: