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gurguliare · 7 years

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the very end dialogue in wise with great wisdom

I will say, this feels like you punishing me for not taking your advice and cutting down on the amount of end dialogue

Andreth rolled to her side, choking.

Aegnor had a hand on her shoulder. Another hand pounded her sternum. But no, it was impossible: she had turned from the dragon. Aegnor gave battle to the north.

I was really laboring to roll up random thematic threads here—Aegnor is Túrin?? Aegnor is fighting in the apocalypse like, six Ages before everyone else does? … It feels right though. Also I had to have the reverse “mistaking Aegnor for Finrod” –> “mistaking Finrod for Aegnor” motion to signal her coming back to reality, I guess. I think I actually had some more complicating reasoning about that which I’ve now forgotten.

Andreth opened her mouth so far the water fell out of its own accord. “The demon?”

drowned rat Andreth is cute

Finrod pointed behind him. Over Aeluin, the Blue-mere, steam hung in banners. It made the wood a weaving. Water hallowed by Melian! Andreth coughed up more of it.

When she only wanted very much to vomit, she said, “I was so afraid it would—know. But it didn’t feel it at all. Our holy place.”

I’m proud of this line because it got Emma. But also it’s a good line I think? Aeluin is my favorite trickster spirit.

“Do you still claim to feel fear?” His voice had lost all its sweetness. His wetted hair formed spikes; his skin was boiled pink. A blood vessel had burst in one eye, painting the white like a dancer’s nail. She tried to sit and he shoved her down, though with exaggerated care. When he spoke again his lips didn’t move, though the voice was still harsh. “Of course it didn’t feel it. It had you to feel for it. Why do you think I didn’t take you here? This wasn’t what we agreed.”

shifting to “telepathy register,” I wish I had just come out and used the word ‘telepathy.’ Like, a lot. Like, “then he let her read his mind, and it was invasive.” Drowned rat FINROD also adorable though

They had agreed on nothing in particular. The last memory, the time she’d lost, lay waiting in his mind. Midnight, and Andreth sick as a dog. Andreth came to Finrod, and whispered in his ear. She had fought him, kissed him, and something like a serpent of smoke poured from her mouth, until he said a word, and grasped the coil.

After, the candle. Her face banded with grainy shade and light, like the lake on a darker day—the lake in winter. What had she told him? Trust me. And fallen back at once into her swoon.

He had thought to repeat the feint, and with unguarded trust lure out the evil.

I don’t know why I bothered to put in so much exposition in this last scene when all my explanations were so cagily phrased that they made the story slightly more confusing. Translation: Finrod successfully performed a PARTIAL exorcism, thought he could get the rest of it out by acting really dumb?? WHY?

He was unguarded now. She fled the vault, hearing, not the sense of his thoughts, but their living sound, sliding over knowledge. It wasn’t like his sendings, he couldn’t make her look, but the lure was great: she had to let her fear for him buffet her away, out of the caverns. How had he hoped to deceive anyone, with his open, stubborn stare? He wasn’t old, for one of his kind. Someone’s lover, someone’s son. That thought she had as penance, and found soothing: he wasn’t hers. But he hadn’t deserved to die in such a way, helping his friend.

I of course wanted the image of Finrod’s mind as basically Nargothrond’s future ruins, complete with an evil worm. Shoutout to Andreth’s double-time rationalizing, if she keeps that up she’ll feel comfortable enough to hit on him in half an hour

And there was knowledge that would have been lost. She had been careless even with her own store. That dream, that radiant dream! She ought to take more students. Not only Finrod, who was losing a war. Under the trees of Eldamar his betrothed might laugh, being regaled; Finrod would use Andreth’s own words, he would say that a mortal had wanted to kill him, and all meaning would alter when, forgiven, he returned. That was well, but it was not wisdom. Andreth had been a poor steward. It was hard, heart high, to feel the weight of her error, when without shedding it, she had been lightened.

She said, “It was what you dreamed. Finrod.” And when that didn’t work: “Lord, let me—”

I was uncertain of my Andreth characterization for some of the earlier sections, but here I feel like I really nailed her generosity, which comes out when she’s distracted, and her real, normal human feelings for her friend cum local regional authority, which Finrod probably does not believe exist. Or, I mean, Finrod knows Andreth is basically a good person, and he’s a good enough work-in-progress himself not to begrudge her that, but I’m not sure he’s always able to integrate her life as a wise woman and healer and community (?) pillar (??) with the furious, kind of disembodied intelligence that confronts him purposefully… if he were able to make that connection in any consistent way he’d be fucked, tbh, it’s the last bulwark. But this passage is about her recognizing the relationship between the two sides, more importantly, so we go from her snide interiority to her expansive sense of duty to her snidely and then earnestly doing her duty. I love her.

He took her fingertips down from his bruised neck without touching her, by smiling. “It’s no Nauglamir,” he said. “But I will wear it preeningly.”

IDIOT

She cast about for some question to clothe her bare concern. “Eilinel?” Eilinel had seemed to lead her through the wood; Finrod must have been close behind her, to save her; perhaps he too had had a guide? She was already tender toward the girl, whom she’d saved, and at one point plotted to kill—she would gladly be grateful to her.

“Safe at home. Ingrim brought me.”

I feel like I thought the ~twist from “Ingrim is a useless coward, the little girl has spark though!” to “Ingrim has no idea what is going on and is therefore fairly useful” would be more satisfying or somehow relevant to anyone’s development than it was. “Andreth is a shitty judge of character” I guess. “Andreth is a good judge of character but ‘character’ is irrelevant 90% of the time”

At the use of his name, Ingrim stepped into view, leading Andreth’s mare. Andreth wondered if he’d noticed that Finrod wasn’t speaking aloud, but Ingrim seemed more inclined to scrutinize Andreth. “My lord,” he said, and as an afterthought, “Wise lady. Might I take my leave? It’s a ways on foot, and my daughter needs feeding.”

So do I! Andreth nearly cried, but her authority hung enough askew already. She nodded instead, and he let go of the reins, giving the mare’s sweat-shiny neck a pat.

Poor Andreth, she legit hasn’t eaten in >20 hours I think and dinner was probably lembas still sweaty from Finrod’s armpit

“I’ll have your son sent home to you,” Andreth said. Ingrim’s brows drew together.

“If you can winkle him out,” he said, and ducked his head in what she took for sullenness, until he smiled.

Again, there was some whole backstory about his broken marriage or whatever?? I have no idea. The problem with writing a fic of this length over the course of three months is then you’ve been writing the fic for three months, which already represents a basic failure of compression technology.

Then they were alone. The mare went solemnly grazing, but declined to drink. Finrod fell back, and the movement pushed Andreth’s eyes up the trees.

“Where’s your horse?”

“He may be taking it as payment.”

“Will he call on our services again, do you think?

“I think he thought we’d smoked hash in his house.”

I begged Emma for a more suitable Middle-earth drug to put here and she was like “lol, no, keep hash.” Now I’m realizing the obvious answer was ‘pipeweed’, but that’s differently dumb.

The athelas back in her hands, unburnt. It hadn’t even been her, and she remembered it so well; the time between had broken like a seal, revealing freshness. In connection to those leaves, she saw many other things. This was why I won, she thought dimly, trying to give a reason, not for her success, but for the fullness that came only now, after she’d risked it. Surely, she was too much to die. But everything could end at once, and be swallowed in the same instant. So, in that case… but… She felt her face grow warm.

Ok I had fun parodying the Important Mortality Epiphanies from earlier, not that those weren’t busily self-parodying whether I wanted them to be or not. Though I also sincerely feel the “wait, you mean THAT’LL disappear forever too? and THAT?” thing of trying to come to grips with oblivion while having no attention span

“It woke me,” Finrod offered. “It and Eilinel. They came in when they saw the smoke. I must tell you, I have noticed your people do not take direction well.”

“How can you say that? I waited for you.”

“You—” She’d gotten him to turn his head, from the sound of crushed bracken. “You started swimming when I called your name.”

This was a joke for Emma and no one else but ‘Andreth’ means patience and earlier Andreth thinks she hears (her own) voice telling her, “Patience!” … so …………..

“Why did you do that?”

This is a fair question I mean he knew she was possessed. True answer: habit

A silence, in which she reflected that she was being cruel. He hadn’t accepted her care. He said, “You waited for me. So it could have gone worse.”

“Better, too, I grant you.”

He snorted. First she thought it was the horse. She got up on one elbow, then sat up when he didn’t speak. “You said—you told me—The other victims. Others have thrown off this curse before?”

“No, adaneth,” he said with his real voice, the rasp of it not scraping the last fondness from the word. Then in thought-speech again: “No one has ever defeated a demon by force of will.”

It hadn’t been that hard. Sickened, almost, and without thinking: “I wouldn’t call it will.”

I was worried “It hadn’t been that hard” was 2 much but I feel like her genuine nausea at the idea of all those people dying JUST because they didn’t have a HOLY LAKE to dive into, plus a complex running mind game with the resident demon, helps soften it

“Oh? Tell me!” Off her look: “I must name your weapons, to make a song of praise. Not ‘will.’ Well, not all wars are. Were you held, then? By love, and loyalty, and bonds of kin?”

“Not quite.” She laced her hands. “I had to make it take both sides of the argument.”

He made a questioning noise, but all she heard was, No one else. He hadn’t had, at any point, the courtesy to sound surprised. What had he seen? The wind had died, and the lake was so like memory that it was leeched of substance. Everywhere but where the steam decayed it.

And yet, and then—the scene shone steadily, though hollowly. The wick was sheathed in void, the void in color. Aegnor was alive now. She had felt him with her, which was all she had wanted. The thought ran through her once and was lost in a throng, which ran jumping, turning, crowing, faster and more fierce when she pretended to be still. The shearing fault, the place to stand; she wished Finrod still doubted her, so she could feel again how sure she was.

She was half-dry. Hunger formed a load in her belly. Her dress was unsalvageable, and clung, but she felt her skin less and less—when she moved it swept back, however, like chasing the shine down a sword. She looked down at Finrod. She saw that, though not surprised, he felt disabling relief; his fear had mastered him, and he lay now as a captive loosed, whose limbs wouldn’t obey. It was true she wasn’t much better off. Her hands ran up her arms in starts: she had sunk that far, rising was the only rest. THIS IS MY FAVORITE BIT. sorry. But where was his hope? Not just for Arda, but for her! Their friendship still to be renewed. Without sharing that hope, Andreth knew of it; they had built it, and she had given it to him. She was sorely aggrieved to find he’d left it by the wayside. That was what came of great haste.

She should have shied from touch, remembering all she had done; but, forgetful, she gave Finrod her hand. Like a child feigning sickness, he pressed it to the side of his face. He must have been exhausted. She couldn’t let him sleep.

This is not a real thing Andreth sleep is good and helps the concussed brain recover

She had destroyed his beautiful harp, so she chose another method. “Ask me to sing.”

“Please.”

Easier than rising was lifting her raw voice. Andreth praised the sun, the stars in summer, which had always been others’ loves. You look at nothing for itself, he’d said, and she had known her people better. Though now the sun pierced her eyes. It wasn’t enough; she had to have it. Love nothing for itself, she almost sang, knowing that when he healed, he might sing it back to her.

… I complained a lot about this section at the time and like, I think it IS still bloated and confusing, partly because of the plot legwork I hadn’t done and partly because of Ingrim, but… I was surprised by how well it worked for me coming back. I wanted it to be self-indulgent and shippy, which it is, but more than that I wanted Andreth to be intensely, variously happy, with a changing texture and a logic that she could come back to and move away from at will, and I think I got that. This was written as a response to Emma’s fic in a bunch of ways, ofc, and one of those things was I wanted to write about someone valiantly and rightly clinging to life, using even suicidal frenzy in the service of survival—not “against” the portrait of Andreth dying in terror (and joyfully, and bravely, etc.) but as the obvious complement to it. Also like, if Andreth’s death is made bearable by that moment of companionship just before, if it’s the split-second courage that needs an audience to push off from, then this is Andreth figuring out how she’ll go it alone for a long, long time, even as she spends the entire fic on the run/with an unwanted passenger crowding her out of her own mind. Uhhh. I hope you expected me to duck ownership of my bad writing decisions with OTP analysis, because, that was never not going to happen. Never ever ever.

#ourlightsinvain #no one expects the fannish inquisition #silmarillion #andreth #finrod

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