Taking Readings I by Himring

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Fanwork Notes

Ratings from General to Teens.

Mature Themes warning in parts.

Some of these pieces are fixed-length ficlets, others are not.

Some, but not all, were written for B2MeM or Tolkien Weekly prompts.

 

Contains pieces written from 2012-2016.

Anthology now closed: for later pieces see Taking Readings II.

Fanwork Information

Summary:

Very short pieces set in Beleriand or Valinor, some of which are slightly experimental.

Now added: Shadowy Cloak (Beren and Luthien, after the fall of Tol-in-Gaurhoth)

Major Characters: Adanel, Aegnor, Andreth, Aredhel, Aulë, Beren, Caranthir, Celeborn, Celebrían, Círdan, Curufin, Durin I, Elrond, Elves, Elwing, Eärendil, Eöl, Fëanor, Finduilas, Fingon, Finrod Felagund, Indis, Lúthien Tinúviel, Maeglin, Míriel Serindë, Nahar, Nerdanel, Oromë, Telchar, Tuor, Vána, Varda, Voronwë, Yavanna

Major Relationships:

Genre: Experimental, Fixed-Length Ficlet, General

Challenges: B2MeM 2011, B2MeM 2012, B2MeM 2016, Companies, Clubs, and Cliques

Rating: Creator Chooses Not to Rate

Warnings: Creator Chooses Not to Warn
Chapters: 19 Word Count: 3, 304
Posted on 25 February 2012 Updated on 28 December 2016

This fanwork is complete.

Table of Contents

Nan Elmoth

For the B2MeM 2011 prompt: Nan Elmoth [Seduction]

Written as a birthday gift for S.

In Defence of Vana, the Ever-Young

On LiveJournal, Dwimordene had challenged me to come up with a defence for the importance of Vana the Ever-Young, who she felt was the most uninteresting of the Valier. So I tried...

The Earth, Singing

Aule designs Durin's brain.

B2MeM 2012 prompt: O-72: In what furnace was thy brain? (W. Blake) [card: Snippets of Verse)

Characters: Aule, Durin, Feanor

Warnings: none

The Girl from Doriath

Earendil and Elwing--at the Havens and later on.

Drabble for the Homophone Challenge at Tolkien Weekly.
Prompt: beech/beach

Rating: PG (themes of displacement)

Dwarven Ale

Four First Age encounters involving dwarven ale:
Finrod Felagund and Cirdan at Mereth Aderthad (before Finrod learned much about dwarves!);
Curufin and Caranthir, sons of Feanor, in Thargelion;
Telchar, Maeglin and his father Eol in Nogrod;
Andreth and her teacher Adanel in Dorthonion.

Triple drabble written for the Homophone Challenge at Tolkien Weekly on Livejournal.
Prompt was: Ail/Ale

On Ezellohar

After the trial of Feanor, two princes of the Noldor are forced to reconsider their desire to leave Valinor.

Fingon & Aegnor

Teens, no warnings

The Red Thread of History

An observer who is not at all impartial is set to record the Doom of the Noldor.

Character: Miriel

Rating: Teens

 

Voronwe comes to Nan-tathren a second time

 

The survivors of the Fall of Gondolin escape southwards

Written for Fandom Stocking 2014 for Lingwiloke

Characters: Voronwe, Tuor

Rating: General

 

The Unnamed Dead

Sindar that were killed by Morgoth and his armies in Beleriand stream into the Halls of Mandos.

Warning for multiple character death (see title and summary), but no explicit gore.

The Foresaken

There are those who leave and those who stay.
Celeborn is one who stays, from the beginning.

 

No warnings, except for some angst

Grey Ship's Cargo

A company of Elves leaves Middle-earth on a ship from the Grey Havens at the End of the Third Age. (The Ring-bearers are not mentioned; nevertheless it could be the same ship.)

Written for the  November drabble challenge at the LOTR community (theme: nostalgia; element: memories).

Rating: PG (on the General side of Teens); no specific warnings except those to do with the theme itself

Voronwe Decides To Dwell at the Havens

After the fall of Gondolin, Cirdan invites Voronwe to Balar.

Gen.

Changing of the Guard

The Valar have withdrawn to Aman, but Orome and Yavanna are still concerned for Middle-earth.

Inspired by Oshun's bio of Nahar, Orome's horse, posted to the Silmarillion Writers Guild archive in the newsletter of February 2016

(Gen)

Without Forethought She Sang

After it's all over, Indis returns to where their courtship began, on the western slope of Taniquetil.

Teens for hints of dysfunctional family relationships and reference to canonical character deaths (Finwe's implied)

A Commission for Nerdanel

Nerdanel, resident artist, meets an unusual challenge with her usual flair.
But who was it who issued that challenge, really?

Characters: Nerdanel, Varda, Ilmare

Teens for some sort of sexual innuendo.
(Femslash, if you squint. You might have to squint quite hard, though.)

Across the Wide Seas of Time

In "The Two Towers", Gandalf says he would like to test his will on the Palantir and see whether he could make it show Feanor at work during the Years of the Trees to him.
This is just a small riff on that...

Gen, no warnings

Fugitives at the Gate

Finduilas saves Gwindor (and Turin).

Written for Isilloth for Fandom Gift Box 2016.

Isilloth asked for a strong Finduilas and for her helping to run Nargothrond in Finrod's absence, if possible.

While I'm in favour of the idea, I couldn't come up with anything to write about the running of Nargothrond, at that point.

So this little piece just picks out that Finduilas would have needed to be strong to get Gwindor accepted in Nargothrond, not just perceptive.

Forward and Back

Sometimes to heal you need to forget, sometimes to heal you need to remember.
A brief conversation between Celebrian and Elrond in Tol Eressea.
Elrond has just arrived from Middle-earth--he has found Celebrian recovered, but also learned that her recovery was slow.

Written for the current "Companies, Clubs and Cliques" challenge at the SWG Archive.

Teens for hints of darker (canonical) background

Shadowy Cloak

After Luthien has freed Beren from the dungeons and the Isle of Werewolves, he lays eyes on her shadow cloak of enchantment for the first time.

Warnings: allusions to past imprisonment and canonical character death (Finrod's)

Comments

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Optimism is a pretty little thing isn't it?  That is the feeling I sense on reading this.  And just because something is beautiful and delicate in appearance it does not mean that it is weak - ask the spider!

Your allusions to various Springtimes in Arda work well throughout the piece along with the snippets of hopeful possibility that this, my favourite, season offers...

Nice is not an offensive word.

Best Regards,

CiH.

Thank you very much! No, nice is not an offensive word at all!

I agree, optimism is pretty, perhaps, but not weak. As I rather tend to pessimism myself, it is something I really admire.

By the way, I was glad to see you are working on The Great Tales of Beleriand again! I've been meaning to re-read, but at the moment I've got  a lot of reading to catch up on.

 

Oh I recall that conversation.  How pleasant to see this pop up today.  This is an excellent way to explain Vána's function, an undying curiosity while the world's other attributes as manifest in the other Valar decline to weariness.  The way you illustrated Vána-nature in several familiar characters was perfect.

I'm glad you approve! Actually, when I had written this, I went back and realized that I'd missed part of the conversation, but that some of what had been said remarkably agreed with what I'd been trying to convey here!

Which reminds that I was going to go and check out Lirillo at HASA, but I haven't got around to it yet...

For whatever reason, from last night to this, I've been lonely, mopey and just plain lazy. I've had all the chapters from this story up in tabs for about a week and only just now read them.

I've noticed that this one in particular has gottent the most attention from your reviewers, and rightfully so. It seems simple at first, but underneath is a deeply uplifting sentiment, and one reading has elevated my entire mood tenfold.

When I'm depressed, I often think about when people tell me that I need to do something different or make some kind of change in order to improve my situation, but it never makes me feel any better nor does it make me feel like acting on that sentiment. I think this little piece highlights why: the new and unexpected should be about the wonder and the possibilities, not just the chance of personal fulfilment.

"And Bilbo runs out the door without a handkercheif." Brilliant, absolutely brilliant.

I'm very sorry to hear you've been depressed--and delighted if this piece managed to lift your spirits a bit!

It's a rather unusual story for me. I was partly influenced by Dwimordene's piece on Nessa, which I had just read-- and so writing it, too, was a bit like an unexpected gift at the time, which I'm happy to share if I can...

I've always thought that not only Fëanor, but all Noldor, must have felt almost "trapped" in Valinor. They really belonged to Middle-Earth, they loved to have their own kingdoms, their own spaces to live, learn and explore. Valinor was, to them, a "golden cage", but a cage anyway.

But the Vanyar, in my headcanon, were different. But it's possible that, as you say, they were also trying to find their own place in Valinor, and, in a way, were as restless as the Noldor. Interesting point of wiew.

Yes, I agree about the Noldor or at least many of them. Not all the Noldor who felt restless were even of Feanor's party and I think at least some of the restlessness was there even before Melkor fanned the flames. Feanor certainly shows it. But it must have been quite a shock after Feanor's trial, for some of them, to realize how they had been manipulated by Melkor nevertheless.

As for the Vanyar, their movements here are more or less canonical: first to Tirion, then to Valmar, then further up Taniquetil. Of course those movements are usually interpreted differently--but it seemed to me that you could argue that there is a similar restlessness here, just in a different direction, with a different focus.

Of course, there is a reason I gave these words to Aegnor: because he has both Vanyarin and Telerin relatives and connections and also because of what we know about his fate later on.