Kindling by Anérea  

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Fanwork Notes

Inspired by two (and a half) interactive Scavenger Hunt prompts:

  • from Himring: someone is looking forward to something and making preparations;
    optional additional prompt to include the colour blue
  • from Independence1776: this photo of a mountain lake with a rocky trail leading down to the shore; green plants and trees line the trail

and a historical prompt:

  • from the Taboo challenge: "All cultures have behaviors that are forbidden. And frankly, our beloved Silmarillion characters get up to quite a lot of them."
Fanwork Information

Summary:

Aerin is miserable and bitter under the domination of Brodda and his people.
A horrible ficlet.

Major Characters: Aerin

Major Relationships:

Genre: Drama, Ficlet, Horror

Challenges: Scavenger Hunt

Rating: Adult

Warnings: Character Death, Check Notes for Warnings, Domestic and Partner Violence, In-Universe Sexism/Misogyny, Rape/Nonconsensual Sex, Suicide
Chapters: 1 Word Count: 365
Posted on Updated on

This fanwork is complete.

Kindling

I've tagged the warnings but it's really mostly implied (rape, abuse, suicidal ideation and suicide).

Read Kindling

The scream lived inside Aerin, building and growing through the interminable years, although no sound of it ever escaped her; and yet that seemed somehow to burn her throat all the more.

She was the one they came to for succour, the bethralled women of the House of Hador. As Brodda's wife her life was no less enslaved, although she had the means to a little more and thus found ways to give a little more in aid. Furthermore, she always found the right words of comfort to give, or if comfort was not to be had then at the very least encouragement. She kept them going, kept their guttering sparks of hope banked, even as hers gradually extinguished.

Once, she had ventured to divulge how weary she was, how hopeless she felt, how much she longed to let go; had dared ask to receive a little of the same comfort in turn. Instead she had met with something like disbelief, something like dismay, but mostly she was met with disdain. "Aerin, you're the strong one," she was told, "and in any case you're a wife, not a slave, you don't need …"

So she held on, fanning that spark of desperate hope for them through her silent screams. For, in those intolerable times, what could choosing to stay alive be, but hope embodied, however faint?

Yet she knew. Knew that never again would she have the freedom she experienced before: to pick wildflowers in the birdsonged woods, to float in the soft turquoise waters of the lake, to revel in the breezes of the green meadows. Never again would she have the freedom of her own body. Once upon a time she had harboured a desire to see the ocean's waves slip upon the shore; now she felt only a longing to know the new beginning that comes after the end, beyond the shores, beyond the ocean, beyond the Circles of the World.

When Túrin returned and cast Brodda down, his burning wrath ignited hers. All her rage, all her pain, all her despair and grief. In those flames her hope flared, and as she burned she knew she would know peace once again.

Chapter End Notes

I saw a note that Aerin is possibly Sindarin meaning "She who desires the Sea", so I've alluded to that too.

Leave a Comment

Yeah, she just appeared to be in a slightly better position compared to most of the other thralls*, and she did her best to help them, but relatively better than absolutely awful doesn't make it easy.

* except Morwen; in some ways I think she had it easier than Aerin and others because even though she had also lost loved ones, struggled for food, etc., Brodda and co. feared her so she was left alone, whereas Aerin was frequently beaten for aiding people.

But I think also people's emotional ability to survive in hardship is drawn from witnessing the resilience of others, so when someone who's perceived to be much stronger is seen to crumple, it can maybe feel like a threat to their own ability to cope ("If it's too much for thec strong person, how could I possibly manage?') and so they opt for denial.

Thanks for reading and commenting. ♡

Once, she had ventured to divulge how weary she was, how hopeless she felt, how much she longed to let go; had dared ask to receive a little of the same comfort in turn.

This hit so deep, the way people who give and give and give aren't seen as needing anything back, and god forbid they show the slightest weakness when others demand they be strong!  God forbid they let the scream out!

Never again would she have the freedom of her own body

I weep

This was painfully beautiful