New Challenge: Allusive
Literature and art constantly refer back to each other using allusions, and this month's prompts are inspired by allusions to literature, myth, art, and history.

Every morning, I leave you; every evening, you bring me back. An endless game—until the day it is not.

Ye'll take the high road / and I’ll take the low road, / and I’ll be in Aman afore ye; / but you and I will never meet again / on the bonnie, bonnie banks of Ivrin.

This is a collection of true drabbles completed for the 'Four Words' drabble bingo card.

Written for an Insta-drabbling challenge for Orctober prompts, but not horror (or fluff either): two drabbles about survivors, Maglor and Haleth.

Rían falls unconscious at the Mound of the Slain and hears Huor's voice telling her to live.

The memories Lalwen holds to or pushes away, on each side of the Ice.

A short history of the Fen of Serech, from happier times until the bitter end.

“Do you think,” Aredhel starts, her tone idle as she wraps the last strip of fabric around his shoulder and ties it tight, “that killing your husband weighs lighter or heavier than slaying your kin?”
Celegorm freezes, his throat going dry. She does not move away, her dark eyes unforgiving upon him.
“That depends,” he finally says, catching her wrist before she can snatch her hand away. “Did you love him?”
Aredhel had visited Himlad. Celegorm decides to find out why.

On the Helcaraxë, Fingolfin invokes his family's strength and courage rather than the Valar.

In the wake of Nirnaeth Arnoediad, the Dwarves of Belegost mourn their dead.

This is a history that has never been told. Those whom it concerns most deeply are dead now, even those who chose or otherwise received the lifespans of Elves. It is a story that has been kept hidden for more than six thousand years. Now, I believe it is past time it should be revealed.

A young Orc on a spirit quest walks through the memories of her people.

Two Orcs discuss the increased price on Beren's head.

Arvedui is gone, and Firiel reflects.

Blood wells to the surface, hot and sticky. It runs over Curufin’s hand and down Finrod’s neck, the smell almost overwhelming. Finrod thrashes when Curufin presses fabric against the wound with enough force that darkness dances along the edges of Finrod’s vision.
He is breathing harshly, and it sends pain lacing through him with every inhale, every exhale. His hands have found Curufin’s legs, his wrist, nails digging into fabric and soft skin.
Finrod would apologise, but he does not think that he has anything but curses and confessions within him.
Finrod gets hurt. Curufin does what he must.

Life as a thrall of Lorgan is not easy. Tuor's capture complicates things.

Dior did not see the arrow until it pierced his own flesh, a hard thrust of a point entering his back and blossoming out of his heart. The pain of the wound, and the feeling of his body in uncertain panic around it, was almost secondary to his curiosity.
Now what?
Dior felt strangely detached, as if he had stepped out of his body. He watched himself fall over the body of the Golodh he’d slain. Dior had worn no helm nor armor that day – and he saw his hair fan out to cover them both. They died together in the dark cloak of it.
Dior’s eyes closed, and all was dark.
~
And then Dior opened his eyes.

Elrond hears a call in the waters of the Bruinen and follows it to the sea. There he finds someone whose memory he has long ago put behind him, but whom he knows at once — only Maglor does not know him. As he revisits his past with Maglor, both painful and fond, Elrond must also reckon with Maglor’s loss of memory. How do you forgive someone who does not remember what he has done?

Maglor had expected it to give him an edge. He had not expected to level the battlefield and the forest, everything but Maedhros who remains, untouched and staring at Maglor as if he has been awoken from a long and terrible sleep.
Even their horses are gone. Maglor’s throat feels as if he has swallowed glass.
The first time they are attacked after Maedhros' rescue, Maglor handles it very well.

Tar-Miriel, still plagued by foresight when nothing can be prevented anymore.

A chance find while tidying up Indis' rooms leads to revelations no one was expecting.

After hearing the Doom of Mandos, Arafinwë returns to Valinor where the remaining Noldor need a new ruler. It appears that the Valar have already made their choice.

Berion, captain of Barad Eithel under King Fingon, laments Fingon's death and the loss of his home.

After the War of Wrath, what was originally planned as a temporary stay (a kind of moral quarantine) on Tol Eressea turns into a permanent settlement. And so we also get another chapter in the history of the White Tree(s).

Beleg comforts Gwindor in Taur-nu-Fuin, and is rewarded.