For a while they charitably indulge Fëanáro’s grief. The poor motherless boy, after all (even if the King’s new wife is gracious and charming and would be more than happy to be the boy’s mother, if he would only leave his grief behind.)
After a while they tire of it. It’s been years, they say. Others who loved Míriel have moved on. It’s unhealthy, they say. Surely it’s time someone encouraged him to move on. Surely we’re just enabling him. It’s attention-seeking. It’s bratty. Perhaps if his father was a little firmer with discipline, they mutter.
Finwë is not perfect – is acutely aware, lately, that he’s made a lot of decisions that hurt the people he loved – but he realizes what none of his courtiers can possibly understand, which is that grief cannot be squashed into a more convenient attitude via discipline.
No, his mistake is not that he doesn’t give Fëanáro a scolding when some thoughtless comment drives his son away from a festival in tears.
His mistake, if we are busy assigning blame, is that he doesn’t try hard enough to keep the gossip from reaching his son’s ears.
Fëanáro is not old enough to understand that this is the nature of politics, that the price of the crown is that his every foible is a matter for public comment and his grief an acceptable subject of dinner conversation. He is old enough to understand that he has become a liability for his father, his pain somehow proof of Finwë’s failure, additional proof of his gaping inadequacies that drove Finwë to remarry in the first place.
The pain does not lessen – the repeated insistence that it is unhealthy, that he really ought to be over it already, does not help. He cannot learn to cope, not when any public mention is apparent proof that he is a petulant brat in need of a firmer hand. Instead he learns that it is shameful, and he learns to keep it hidden.
Míriel’s name is never spoken in their home again.
//Reasons why I love lintamande. Also if I read somewhere ever again that Finwe had just to scold him more, I’m going to set that person on fire.
There’s a lot of characters I love in Elden Ring, and I think they really, really, really deserve a break.
So I invited them all to a BBQ party at the beach.
Happy y'all like these! :’)
Some people asked me for wallpaper versions of it, so here’s a better (1080p) version of it, in normal and dark modes! (please do not repost, instead, reblog!):
The word aroflux is commonly used to describe a romantic orientation that fluctuates on the aromantic spectrum or between the aromantic spectrum and alloromantic
[ID: An edit for Miriel, headcanoning her as aroflux. It’s mainly coloured in pinks and greens with a hint of yellow, since these are the colours of a common aroflux pride flag.
A bamboo forest in mist
A cropped image of Zhang Xue Ying, a chinese actress, in a period drama. She’s an east asian woman with a long black ponytail wearing yellow hanfu and a coat with floral embroidery
Text on a pink background reading “Miriel” and “Queen of the Noldor, first wife of Finwe, mother of Feanor”
The roof of an old east asian building with a floral pattern painted on it
Two hands, a light- and a darkerskinned one, reaching for each other
Details of floral embroidery
Pink crystals
Black hair streaked with white
Zhang Xue Ying in the drama “Princess Silver”, with white hair and wearing yellow hanfu
Painted paper umbrellas in pink and green
Rolls of yarn
Text on a pink background reading “Therinde” and “the broidress, genius fibreworker and handmaiden of Vaire
I have alreday posted Miriel, but I thought it would fit to post her again with Finwë because, well, they are sort of a serie. And like I said long ago, I should draw Indis too, and I am actually starting to consider it again. But don’t mention Finwë’s hair.
Trans Celegorm who everyone saw as like, Míriel reborn (not literally but close enough), rebelling by being wild and angry and masculine and unlike his grandmother in every way
Only later does he discover she too was a hunter, she too would not be silenced, she too was proudly masculine in a way that made people whisper when Finwë looked upon her with love
For Tyelko, his gender was a proud refusal of who he was “supposed” to be. For Míriel, her gender was a proud embrace of who she was in spite of what people thought of her.
Trans Tyelko and gnc Míriel, grandson and grandmother who only met in death, who are mirror reflections of each other, who both clung to their pride and their family despite the doom those paths led down to.
and not to be a Hobbit movie fan on main, but; “I am not my grand[mother]” says local prince desperately trying to escape and to cling to his family legacy both at once
I can’t help finding it funny that Míriel has absolutely no reservations about her decision to remain dead, until the moment when Finwë dies and join her in the Halls - upon which she rapidly decides to return to life.
I know it’s not the canon explanation, but without any other context, you’d think she wanted to get away from him.
Made even funnier by Finwe being like “…I can’t go back to life because Indis would immediately murder me again”
I can’t help finding it funny that Míriel has absolutely no reservations about her decision to remain dead, until the moment when Finwë dies and joins her in the Halls - upon which she rapidly decides to return to life.
I know it’s not the canon explanation, but without any other context, you’d think she wanted to get away from him.
WatchingRebecca and thinking of Indis and the empty spaces left, the sense of not-belonging, of not measuring up, of competing with a ghost and losing. She was a genius. Her tapestries fill the house. Her genius son glares from the shadows at you if you so much as touch them with a fingertip. You’re not a genius. You’ve never made anything but spontaneous, uncrafted songs. You love to run and play at sports in the outdoors and come home in disarray. She was always immaculate; you can’t have dirt if you work with textiles.
Your fear your husband will never love you the way he loved her. You fear he’ll never love your children the way he loves her son.
