New and Updated Fiction

A sight twist on the choice of Elrond and Elros.

“What are you doing here?" Tyelpe hisses, face mere inches from Sauron's own, eyes almost painfully dark without the light of the trees shining in them. It sends a pang of loss through his chest, and he knows it is his own fault that the light is gone, but he had not thought to ever have to deal with the consequences. Had not thought he would ever have to look Tyelpe in the face and acknowledge what he’d done.

"I wanted to see you," he says, voice sounding strange to his own ears.

The first time Curufin kisses Finrod, it is to provoke.

There is no deeper meaning to it. Only a cousin with a pleasant smile and mild words; only Curufin's unending need to break things and a violence that has been hanging from his fists since they stepped into these caves.

He expects Finrod to reel back with disgust, expects him to be scandalized, to be offended, to narrow his eyes, maybe even to threaten. He does not expect for Finrod's mouth to open beneath his, Finrod's hands coming up to fist in his robes and pull him close. He bites at Finrod's lip savagely, and Finrod bites harder, smiling into the kiss when copper bursts bright between them.

It really only continues escalating from there.

Maedhros glimpses a familiar face across a battlefield. But it's not his brother. It can't be.

Even under the renewed Light of the Trees, after the Last Battle has been fought, Darkness has not fully passed from this world.

At the end of all days, when sun and moon are no more, Túrin Turambar shall face Morgoth and slay the Foe.

Yet in the dark, the Elves wait in vain for Túrin's return. Beleg Cúthalion knows he will find him. But first, Gurthang, the black sword made of the iron of a fallen star, shall be re-forged. When he visits its smith, Beleg meets someone unexpected.

The last of the Elven ships are sailing and Maglor’s feet are restless. In the surreal version of reality his mind supplies there are ghosts to wrestle and hard truths to confront. In Tol Eressëa, Nerdanel swallows her own hurts in order to care for her son.

Written for TRSB 2026 Art #114: In Ammë's embrace once more as part of a collaboration with tomefaired based on their absolutely gorgeous cosplay, which can be found in the last chapter and here.

“Are you not warmer than you’ve ever been, right here?”

In the library of Imladris, Erestor copies a manuscript and has thoughts about the Valacirca, the Sickle of the Valar.

“Can you wait that long?” Findekáno asks.

“Yes,” snaps Maitimo , though in truth he is not so sure. His bladder is ridiculously full, swollen and aching, jostling around uncomfortably with every step he takes. It takes a concerted effort of will not to squirm around awkwardly or grab himself between the legs each time the urgency spikes. He glances at Findekáno. “Stop enjoying this so much.”

***

The Gardens of Lórien are one place in Aman Maitimo absolutely, unequivocally, cannot piss. He will have to find a creative solution to this predicament.

But Aredhel knew better than her mother; she was stronger, she was more willful, she was enlightened. She would not make the same mistakes Anairë had made. She would find a way to do it all differently.

***

Re-embodied in Aman, Aredhel struggles to come to terms with all that has changed, and all that has not.

Celebrimbor reflects on his life and his childhood in Tirion. 

A young Celegorm and Curufin befriend an old Spruce tree. 

The Valar tell them that they cannot return to Beleriand and Elwing accepts this easily, for she has no reason to return. Sirion is destroyed, naught but ash and rubble and dried blood. The Fëanorians had kidnapped her sons and, she is sure, slain them before she and Eärendil even reached Valinor. There is nothing left for her there.

It takes four years for rumors to reach her ears that her sons likely still live.

Fingon understood that hope was a choice. It was careful and deliberate, and it was hard, and the times when having hope seemed the most impossible were the times one had to choose it over and over again, every second of every day. This was the fundamental truth at the core of Fingon’s beliefs, the centre around which he understood the world and his place in it.

Very seldom did he waver in this conviction more than he did in the months following the Dagor Bragollach.

***

Fingon inherits the crown. Maedhros comes to Barad Eithel in the hour of his grief. Together, they figure out a way to move forward.

When uneasy dreams bring him back into Beleriand, Daeron finds a pair of twins who have lost their home, and an enemy who has lost himself. The Shadow's reach is growing ever longer, and if they are to survive, they must do it together.

The impossible happened: a Silmaril has been stolen from Morgoth’s crown. Maedhros decides to reunite the People of Beleriand against the Enemy and attack him while he is still unprepared, which is by no means less impossible. Meanwhile, in the hidden city of Gondolin, Lord Glorfindel of the Golden Flower pursues the meaning of his recurring dreams – only to realize that he is not the only one to see them...

|| A novel-length canon gapfiller on the Union of Maedhros, the Nirnaeth Arnoediad and the downfall of the Sons of Feanor; plus my take on what could have been going on in Gondolin between the Bragollach and the Nirnaeth. ||

Eärendil and Elwing reflect upon their personal and political future during a very long and intimate night

Lalwen after the Dagor Bragollach.

This is a draft of one of nine short stories set within the Tolkien Legendarium, each recounting a possible origin for one of the Nine Mortal Men corrupted by the rings of Sauron.

Indis visits Formenos in the aftermath of the Darkening

On Tides of Light, Antariëarcalindalë, begins with Elwing's arrival upon the shores of Eldamar after her flight from the ruins of Sirion. After Eärendil goes alone into Valinor, Elwing is brought to Alqualondë. Rather than hurrying toward the celestial ascent of Vingilot, the core of the narrative is the salt-crusted halls of Alqualondë, where the Falmari must finally confront the devastating history of Beleriand's three kinslayings. 

Elwing must plead the Teleri to bear the Host of the West across the Sea. Despite a mother, survivor and also bearer of a Silmaril - the First Age converged on her: the weight of its sins, its accumulated grief, and the grace through which salvation may yet enter history.

Finarfin was always tired, but suddenly he was exhausted, just by this conversation. It would just go in circles if they let it, neither of them willing to concede to the other. He didn’t have the words for what he really wanted to say—and even if he did he wouldn’t say them. They would be a child’s words, just hurt that he had been left alone while his older brothers and sisters had gone off without him, taking everything with them that he had ever held dear. 

Family is complicated, and Finarfin is tired.

On an evening of late summer, in the shining hour of the mingling, Prince Curufinwë Fëanáro strides into Taniquetil’s teeming festival halls with the new-wrought Silmarils blazing upon his brow. That night, fire consumes Findaráto’s dreams.

***

Finrod struggles under the weight of foresight.

Gwindor and Celebrimbor share their fears, after a council meeting in which Túrin got his way.