January 2025 Instadrabbling writings: Olwë, Tuor, Illuvatar, Finrod, Dior, Gil-galad by Quente

Olue, sitting in a small sailing vessel a half-day’s journey from his shell-and-sand castle in Alqualondë, squinted out at the sea. The day was calm, but a very small, localized storm was coming, one that would normally have sent him scurrying to take down his sail. 

But he was calm, and waited, pipe still in his hand.

Soon, a friend hopped neatly out of the waves and on board, trailing an appreciative, watery hand over the edges of Canuahen’s carven boards.

“A good vessel. It barely tickles when it rides above me, you nearly caught me unawares,” the wave-master said, tossing his hair to splatter the golden boards of the deck.

“You’re trying to distract me, lord, when you know my question,” Olue said, eyeing him sternly.

“Ah,” Ulmo said, and his expression – and surrounding sea – settled into a flat dullness. “I rued my decision, then. But when I let their – your – ships through to land, my only thought was that everyone deserves the chance to fly.”

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Life in Gondolin was beyond anything Tuor had known. Not half a day had passed since the God had left him trembling before Turgon, the mightiest of Elven kings. And now, Tuor was in a bathing chamber, grander than any work of Men.

He stared with dazed eyes as the metal of the spigot turned to release water into his hands. The water was hot, flowing from a source not natural but invented, somehow harnessing the powers of water and wind to stoke a furnace far above them on one of the peaks of the encircling mountains.

Tuor shuddered, feeling the heat penetrate into his hands for the first time in days, weeks, a season. Voronwë, removing his first and second layers of cloak beside Tuor, had a similarly dazed expression.

“My lord Círdan would have given his left arm for hot water from a metal sluice,” Voronwë chuckled, “not that King Turgon was ever generous with his blueprints.”

“I remember seeing these in Nevrast, and wondering what on earth it meant,” Tuor said, watching as the water rose in beautiful hot steam from the growing bath. “I think I’m even beginning to thaw.”

“So, get in,” Voronwë prompted, setting his own foot into the pool, now ankle-deep, and hissing with the heat of it.

Tuor hastened to remove the rest of his clothes.

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Illúvatar had to create time before he could create music
He had to create ending before he could create a beginning
The last mortal drew a last breath as the story spooled outward,
The first mortal opening her eyes and seeing the bright sky above her.

Time, and endings, all gathered together in the music stave of the universe,
Fierce brass – there, his fiery son. Strings – the tears of Nienna. 
A steady beating heart of order in the drums – Mandos, his most orderly son.
And at the center, unapologetic, the creator raised his baton,

“In the ending there was nothing but the void. Now, we begin.”

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Dior wondered what having a sister would be like.

He wanted her to be like his father: short, ruddy of complexion, broad of body, and well-muscled. Of course, she wouldn’t have the same rough map of scars that the Valar had allowed to remain upon his father when he returned from the dead. Instead, she’d be a clean slate, and life would write on her with a gentler hand. She’d be kind, and when she attracted the hungry gazes of others like his mother did, she’d be strong enough to punch them directly in the face.

Hiding in a tree from his most recent suitor, Dior realized he was jealous of this invisible sister. 

And then he realized that he was not wishing for a sister so much as wishing all of this for himself.

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There was not much left of his Fëa, but what he had, Finrod dragged out of the dark place. He heard the call, of course he did. But after everything – after all that he’d given (and taken) from the land, SURELY that wasn’t all there was.

Gritting his teeth, Finrod journeyed. His Fëa a bare spark, he withstood the call with all his might, purposefully turning East, toward the lands that he hadn’t seen yet. Perhaps his sister was there, somewhere beyond the Ered Luin, and would help him find a way to keep living.

But there was only so far his spirit could take him. At the very end of his tether, and as far East as he could get, he saw a traveler at a campsite. It was a Secondborn, sitting with an Elf-child; but Finrod could see with his spirit-eyes that this child was alive in Hröa only: a thrall, wandered free.

It was strangely easy to slide into this form, and turn the little face to watch the Man.

“Oho! So you are awake, little Alf. Eat some of that gruel – it’s better fare than you’ll get from most riders out on the road. Eat up, we have a long journey  ahead of us.”

The language was strange, but Finrod found that it wasn’t so far away from the language of Men. He obediently took a spoon of gruel, and found it better fare than he’d had in -- 

“What’s your name, young one? You have a fey look about you, but I shouldn’t just call you Alf as I’d started to, if you’ve a name of your own.”

“Alf suits me,” Finrod said, haltingly, in his new piping voice. Names had power, even with the race of Men. “Who are you, master?”

“Ah. They call me Rider, but I am a cook by trade. Would you like to join me, or do you have a home you’d like me to return you to?”

“No…I have no home, not anymore,” Finrod said, thinking. “I will join you, Master Rider.”

Chapter End Notes

Crossover fic, with thanks to Smith of Wootton Major. This will probably become its own fic in time.

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Gil-galad stood with Círdan on the island of Amon Ereb, looking out over the new sea that lapped against the Ered Luin. There were several ships docked in the timber-strewn bay, as near to the island as they could reach.

Elves were working near the shore, lashing the plentiful wood into more rafts.

“I know you think this a fool’s errand,” Gil-galad said, watching as another group of workers corralled frightened deer on the slopes of the mountain into a makeshift pen.

A doe and two fauns hopped into the pen more willingly than Gil-galad thought they would, and he smiled.

“It is,” Círdan responded, his brows beetling as the first raft, full of cages containing squirrels, raccoons, and field mice, touched the edge of his ship. Sailors raised the cages in an assembly line, one of them shouting his displeasure as a small creature bit his hand.

Gil-galad laughed. “That fellow is cursing me, at least.”

“And so will I, when a mouse escapes and I can’t find it in my heart to get rid of her family in my hold.”

But Gil-galad knew that Círdan knew why they were doing it. All of that life needed somewhere to land; the small island would soon be stripped of all that could sustain them.

“At least you didn’t ask for the insects.”

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