The Well by Independence1776

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Fanwork Notes

All belongs to Tolkien and the Tolkien Estate.

Thanks to Jen for looking this over, and especially to my betas Dawn Felagund and LadyLunas.

ETA: I know that many people enjoy this story because of its more spiritual nature, and I hope you continue to do so. But the fic has a bit of an odd history, spirituality-wise. It was literally the last gasp of my Catholic faith; after I wrote it, I no longer had problems calling myself a non-Christian.

Fanwork Information

Summary:

Post Fourth Age. Maglor meets someone unexpected. Nominated in the 2009 MEFAs.

Major Characters: Maglor

Major Relationships:

Genre: General

Challenges:

Rating: General

Warnings:

Chapters: 1 Word Count: 601
Posted on 25 February 2009 Updated on 25 February 2009

This fanwork is complete.

Table of Contents

The Well

Comments

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I very much liked this!

I'll note especially that I love your choice of words and style, it fits the piece perfectly! The reference to the Flame Imperishable was excellent.

It always makes my inner fangrrl smile to see Maglor get a happy ending. Thank you for posting :D

Thank you so much! I\'m so glad the style worked. The strange thing is that, like Tolkien\'s \"Leaf by Niggle,\" it came to me all at once and there was very little I changed.\r\n\r\nOh, good. I was a little worried about the Flame Imperishable sentence being a little cliched.\r\n\r\nI firmly believe that he deserves a happy ending. All of the Feanorians suffered too much, and he was the only one who wanted to renounce the Oath.

I had to sit down and read it again, drinking in the meaning of Eru's words and Maglor's reaction to it. What I so like about this piece is that in a way you leave Maglor's pride and intent of why he still lingers intact, it doesn't feel forced, he still feels very willful and proud. He just adapts to new worlds - Aramaic *squee*, however he still tries to seek out new boundaries. What if he comes across a well that is thusly poisoned that he might die? Just great food for thought and I love to see that in a story.

It feels right to me, personally, that Eru himselfs shows that he is forgiven, again not forced and too dramatic, just perfect. This story is a gem, gently written with a beautiful pacing and you take your time with revealing your intent in it. *thumbs up*

 

In the interest of full disclosure, I am not one of the faithful.  But that does not preclude my appreciation of a lovely story of redemption and forgiveness.  This is poignant and clearly written with care.  So much of The Silmarillion is unrelentingly sad and drenched with regret.  In spite of my cynical nature, I still like to see those sparks of hope.  Thank you for giving hope and then some to Maglor at the side of that well in the desert.

Thank you so much! I think that if we didn\'t have hope, we wouldn\'t get much done.\r\n\r\nAs for your not being Christian, that doesn\'t matter to me. I\'m not one myself, even though I was raised Catholic, though I do believe in a somewhat deistic God (whom I actually prefer to call Eru). The reason it\'s set in that particular circumstance is that Middle-earth was created as mythology set in our world, it\'s stated in Athrabeth that there are Edain who believe \"that the One will enter Arda,\" and that Tolkien\'s Christian beliefs underlie his work. This is probably the most explicitly religious fanfic I\'ll ever write, but the story popped into my head fully formed, and I couldn\'t ignore it.