Fanworks Tagged with Alternate Universe

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.

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The Rings have been forged. The armies of Mordor are marching into Eriador. Eregion burns. 

Far away from it all, by the shores of the Sea, Celegorm remembers his name.

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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.

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Celebrimbor's torture expands in a new, highly visible direction. He handles this just fine (lie). Sauron is equally unaffected (lie).

Cannibalism will not help, but Celebrimbor is willing to try it.

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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.

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Some journeys cannot be lightened, and some destinies cannot be commanded.

Fëanor rejects Mandos. He burns Halls and leaves ash behind him, as defiant in death as he was in life. 

In the Void, he encounters something else. 

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When Finwë's wife Miriel died, leaving behind their young daughter Fëanor, Finwë petitioned the Valar for permission to remarry. Although he loved his daughter dearly, he said, he needed a son who could be his heir.

Or: Genderswapped Noldor politics, from Fëanor daughter of Finwë to Gil-galad daughter of Orodreth. 

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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.

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Erestor lay up against a tree, brown washed to black in the wet of the snow. The black disc of the new moon sailed across the dark sky. Erestor wished it were gone. He had no need to look into dark eyes any longer.

He was dying.

(AKA Erestor unwittingly travels back in time to the days between the Dagor Bragollach and the Nirnaeth Arnoediad, meets the sons of Feanor, Thingol and his ilk, many Laiquendi, many Dwarves, and Men besides, and THEN decides to solve the drowning of Beleriand himself. This has nothing to do with his personal problems. Nope. Not at all. Erestor is having regular feelings.)

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The story diverges from canon at the beginning of the Second Age (SA 600). In this alternate timeline, Sauron does not adopt the guise of Annatar to deceive the Elves of Eregion. Instead, he pursues a different path of dominion - one that threatens the very foundations of Arda itself.

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"It is a fictional world, but so many readers, deep down, cannot help but entertain the possibility that in some universe, these stories may in fact be true..."

At a Tolkien conference in the Seventh Age, Findekáno listens to the inspiring words of a curious Quenya scholar among the Atani, and makes a new friend.

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Miranda Otto, lead writer on the docudrama Heroes and Monsters, has major writers' block.  A chance encounter at her local coffee shop might be just the thing she needs to pen her Season Two opener.

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Later, Fëanáro will look back on this moment, on finding Melkor bearing down on Ñolofinwë, and try to brush off the panic that had gone striking through him as irrelevant. It is a panic he would have felt no matter who was engaged in such a foolish fight and so, it does not matter.

Lies, even to oneself, work best when they are shrouded in truth. This does not make them less of a lie.

Or: Loop 4 & a glimpse into Fëanáro's thoughts at the start.

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In the heart of a dark forest, Fingon finds two children who should not be there.

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Nel cuore di una foresta oscura, Fingon trova due bambini che non dovrebbero essere lì.
Personaggi: Fingon, Eluréd, Elurín.

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Two members of the crew of the starship Vérië land on the planet Andúnië, investigating a location of interest called The Sleeping Garden.

(Introducing: a Space Opera Númenor AU.  Let's be real, it was only a matter of time.)

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He was going to die. The molten rocks would burn him just like the cursed gem in his palm did. Maybe less painfully but still being burnt hurt and Maedhros knew it. He intimately knew it from his time in Angband where Þauron burnt him often in frustration and to toy with him and his master burnt his skin even more often just to mock his ancestry. At least here he would pass on to Mandos and not linger in pain only to be sewed back together to be tortured again and again.

But it wasn't true for his next clear memory was of the same pain from which he escaped soon and half-mad entered the Girdle to never never leave till now.

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“They can’t just assume we’ll let them leave us behind.”
“But they are, and they will. Our fathers are the Heads of their Houses. Fëanáro is king. Defiance would be treason, beloved.”
“I am his firstborn.”
“You are his only daughter.”
“I have done everything to be the son he wished me to be.”
“And yet, you are not.”

Findekánë and Maitindë do not go to Beleriand with their fathers. This changes very little, and yet so much.
For Scribbles and Drabbles 2025 SFW Slide 213 Two Queens

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Rescued from a brutal Angband hunt, an ex-thrall with a strange and powerful artifact embedded in his spine is brought to Himring, for it is one of the only places in Beleriand which welcomes such folk. Though he has no memories of his life before, Anniavas slowly becomes accustomed to his new life and finds he has a queer connection with Maedhros, Himring's lord. As their intimacy grows, however, so do the dangers surrounding them, both without and within. What secrets are hidden inside the depths of Anniavas's lost memories--and how will those with whom he is forging and deepening bonds react, when those secrets are at last revealed?

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As a very young elfling, Mablung's heart chooses its companion, and Mablung stays true to this love until the end of his life in Middle-Earth.

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In the wake of the fall of Númenor, the penal colony at Andrast is liberated by Sauron's forces. One of the Historians' College of Númenor bears witness.

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The elves of Beleriand lose the first battle against Morgoth. The Noldor find the free lands they'd been looking for. Lúthien is on the warpath.
And the First Age still is as bloody as it is in canon.
(Please read the author's notes, there will reading-instructions, as this is my first attempt at a deconstructed fic)

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After Maedhros and Maglor stole the two silmarils and escaped Ëonwë's camp, Elrond and Elros had followed the two in secret. And when the two casted the gems in their respective resting places, the four of them woke up to a dark Arda, along with the cursed beloved gems.

Nothing was right in this Arda.

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“What if,” said Manwë, regarding Maedhros with star-bright eyes, blue as sapphires and piercing as blades, “you were sent from these Halls for a purpose, son of Fëanáro?”
“I suppose, my lord,” Maedhros said slowly, “that would depend upon the purpose.”

Maedhros is sent back to Middle-earth, in the company of the Maia Olórin. 

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Taking my boys out of Doriath and into a modern AU, so they can be sweethearts without me tearing the relationship between Elu and Melian apart.
On their last day of term, Elu comes home from uni sick. Mablung knows how to make him better.

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