The big Silmarillion ficbunny
Apr. 7th, 2004 11:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
winterAs I mentioned on the blog, it's time to face the music. Just about everyone on my blogroll has a livejournal now, and I haven't been keeping up with their non-lj musings anyway. So this will now be updated much more frequently as my fandom/whatever notebook, while whimsy and some Real Life stuff will stay in the blog.
Case in point: my big Silmarillion thingie. I've been wibbling about it for a month now. It will possibly be called "Battle Scars" or "No Journey Without Scars".
Just now, the not-quite-main character Taithrenwen (called Taith by everyone who knows Sindarin better than she does) poked me and decided she wants an introduction, and preferably before Celegorm finishes waxing lyrical about the weather in the prologue to the first story in the series, "All Along the Watchtowers". She didn't let me go until 500 words later.
excerpt from All Along the Watchtowers
Huan was lying by the prone form of an elf, the only two-legged being alive in the clearing. The hound was looking at the pool of blood by the elf's thigh, but a knife clutched in a trembling hand kept him from venturing closer.
Celegorm looked again. Despite the almost-shorn hair and the clothes, the elf was female, though little of her feminine traits remained. As she looked up at him, he saw that her face was marred with a deep grove of a scar that ran halfway across her face, from the bridge of her nose to her right ear.
"Are those all the orcs?" Caranthir demanded brusquely in Sindarin as he turned his horse to survey the clearing.
"This band, yes." The elf-woman's Sindarin was accented and halting, as if she was not used to speaking it. "Another came with them through the mountains - their paths diverged three hours' march from here."
She tried to rise to her knees, but the wounded thigh pained her too much, for she sat back down with a muted yelp. Celegorm quickly dismounted and reached for his box of medicine supplies.
"Let me help you with this," he asked as he knelt by her on the forest floor.
She nodded, her face drawn and pale. This close, he saw that two more scars marred the left side of her face, one over an eyebrow and another tugging down the corner of her mouth. He cut the leg of her leggings to access the wound, a deep grove cut by an orc-arrow that had thankfully not stuck in the flesh.
"I am Celegorm Feanorion, and this is my brother Caranthir, lord of these lands," he told her as he wrapped the bandage around her thigh. "May I have your name? Your errand I can guess at."
She grinned as she turned her head slightly and took in the sight of the orc bodies all over the clearing. "In your speech, I would be... Taithrenwen."
Celegorm frowned. Though the Sindarin words were put together clumsily, he recognized their meaning: the marked woman, the scarred one. "That is not a kind name."
"I don't have much use for kindness," she murmured. Then she hissed as he helped her up, but this time her legs held her weight.
"Can you guide us to where the other orc-band went?" Caranthir demanded.
Taithrenwen nodded. "They should be within an hour's ride."
"We should call up guards from one of your outposts," Celegorm cautioned his brother.
The darker son of Feanor considered this. "Send Huan to the camp we passed an hour hence. He will play messenger, and we will finally get some sport in our hunt."
Taithrenwen waited while Celegorm tied a note to Huan's collar and sent the hound away. "Will he find the way?" she asked.
"He is a hound of the West, a gift from one of the Powers that dwell there. He will no sooner lose his way than I would," Celegorm explained as he helped the elf-woman onto his own horse, then nimbly jumped up and settled in beside her. "Lead the way, lady Taith, and tell us of how the orcs broke through our leaguer."
</lj-cut
Case in point: my big Silmarillion thingie. I've been wibbling about it for a month now. It will possibly be called "Battle Scars" or "No Journey Without Scars".
Just now, the not-quite-main character Taithrenwen (called Taith by everyone who knows Sindarin better than she does) poked me and decided she wants an introduction, and preferably before Celegorm finishes waxing lyrical about the weather in the prologue to the first story in the series, "All Along the Watchtowers". She didn't let me go until 500 words later.
excerpt from All Along the Watchtowers
Huan was lying by the prone form of an elf, the only two-legged being alive in the clearing. The hound was looking at the pool of blood by the elf's thigh, but a knife clutched in a trembling hand kept him from venturing closer.
Celegorm looked again. Despite the almost-shorn hair and the clothes, the elf was female, though little of her feminine traits remained. As she looked up at him, he saw that her face was marred with a deep grove of a scar that ran halfway across her face, from the bridge of her nose to her right ear.
"Are those all the orcs?" Caranthir demanded brusquely in Sindarin as he turned his horse to survey the clearing.
"This band, yes." The elf-woman's Sindarin was accented and halting, as if she was not used to speaking it. "Another came with them through the mountains - their paths diverged three hours' march from here."
She tried to rise to her knees, but the wounded thigh pained her too much, for she sat back down with a muted yelp. Celegorm quickly dismounted and reached for his box of medicine supplies.
"Let me help you with this," he asked as he knelt by her on the forest floor.
She nodded, her face drawn and pale. This close, he saw that two more scars marred the left side of her face, one over an eyebrow and another tugging down the corner of her mouth. He cut the leg of her leggings to access the wound, a deep grove cut by an orc-arrow that had thankfully not stuck in the flesh.
"I am Celegorm Feanorion, and this is my brother Caranthir, lord of these lands," he told her as he wrapped the bandage around her thigh. "May I have your name? Your errand I can guess at."
She grinned as she turned her head slightly and took in the sight of the orc bodies all over the clearing. "In your speech, I would be... Taithrenwen."
Celegorm frowned. Though the Sindarin words were put together clumsily, he recognized their meaning: the marked woman, the scarred one. "That is not a kind name."
"I don't have much use for kindness," she murmured. Then she hissed as he helped her up, but this time her legs held her weight.
"Can you guide us to where the other orc-band went?" Caranthir demanded.
Taithrenwen nodded. "They should be within an hour's ride."
"We should call up guards from one of your outposts," Celegorm cautioned his brother.
The darker son of Feanor considered this. "Send Huan to the camp we passed an hour hence. He will play messenger, and we will finally get some sport in our hunt."
Taithrenwen waited while Celegorm tied a note to Huan's collar and sent the hound away. "Will he find the way?" she asked.
"He is a hound of the West, a gift from one of the Powers that dwell there. He will no sooner lose his way than I would," Celegorm explained as he helped the elf-woman onto his own horse, then nimbly jumped up and settled in beside her. "Lead the way, lady Taith, and tell us of how the orcs broke through our leaguer."
</lj-cut
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-07 02:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-07 10:47 pm (UTC)Gina