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sweetearthandnorthernsky · 7 months

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44 for dealers choice?

44. Torture/Interrogation. part 1 of morinel's fun times in dol guldur that started as an au but i have no idea where its going now. It goes with/is very adjacent to this one, though it takes place before it. Warnings for uh, torture, obviously, although it isn't too graphic (I think). And also 'Sauron Gorothul Being an Asshole' (no this is not the one the poll was made about)

You wake in the dark.

Your head screams at you, and you reach to steady yourself as you sit up from the hard, packed dirt beneath you.

Your hand brushes rough stone –

The malice rolling off the bricks burn and you wince, pulling back. You cannot see your hand very well in the darkness that feels like a heavy blanket, but by the way your hand throbs, there must be a lingering mark.

The cell is tiny.

Your clothes, slightly ripped and slightly singed, brush the walls. The motion causes faint heat-blisters on your shoulders and ankles every time you breathe.

You have to sit very, very carefully in the center to keep yourself from touching more of the cursed stone – and they are cursed, and you recognize the foul residue of he that cursed it far to well – than necessary, though by the very design it is impossible to completely avoid touching the walls.

You were foolish.

You were incredibly foolish, stumbling headfirst into what you knew would lead to such a folly if you made the slightest mistake, which you did.

Your rune-stones are gone, your sword is gone, even the small blade you keep hidden in your gauntlet is gone.

Your boots are gone too, though you cannot fathom why.

There is no door to your cell, just another long line of brick. There is a faint light that falls through a tiny, tiny opening dozens of feet above you.

It reminds you of being trapped in a well, though your cell is not circular.

You don't know how much time passes. The light that peaks through the ceiling remains the same at all hours. You do not sleep.

Sorcerers flood the cell, one of the walls swings open. The engineering of the door almost impresses you.

Almost.

Your eyesight swims in the fumes that the open door lets in, and you cannot count them very well, but you would guess that there are maybe eight.

You try to speak, only to find that you cannot.

They yank you to your feet with that same burning touch, and you wince. They bind your eyes, bind your hands and even bind your ankles.

The jagged gravel is rough beneath your feet, and you stumble more than once.

You feel strangely powerless without your runes, and your hands twitch at your side as you walk.

The sorcerers don't like this.

They reward you with a burning hand on your shoulder and you bite your cheek to keep from crying out.

You marvel at your captors and their strength that they can wound you with just a touch. They are sorcerers, and yes, that makes them powerful, but you are a child of the Eldar, and a grandchild to the Spirit of Fire himself.

You cannot fathom where they get their power.

(A lie -- you do not want to fathom where they get their power. Deep down you already know.)

You are shoved through a doorway and a wall of heat washes over you. Your fingers twitch as a voice speaks a language that is both familiar and not. Your blindfold is ripped from your eyes and you stumble, trying to orient yourself.

When you take in the sight before you, there is nothing for you to do but laugh. It echoes strangely in the space, bouncing off the bare metal walls and the workstations before fading into silence.

The irony is not lost on you.

“How original,” you manage, looking at Gorothul. “A forge? A little… heavy handed on the symbolism, do you not think?”

You continue, because you have never known when to stop.

“Tell me, Sorcerer, when was the last time your master touched a forge? Do you think he still remembers how? Why else would he elect to build a forge here of all places? Tell me, what has he made? It would surely be a shame if he did not remember how.”

Gorothul crosses his arms as a scowl flickers across his face but it disappears as quickly as the storms on the Helevorn would. “We are not here to play games,” he says succinctly. He takes a step closer to you.

“We are here to discuss what you know of this assault, and surely, you must know much.”

Your hands are still bound, and you aren’t sure what the sorcerers did to the rope that binds your wrists, but it seems to bite deeper into your skin the longer it stays on.

“What makes you say that?” You ask, trying to stall. You don’t know how much information Gorothul already has, and you are loath to give him more.

His face turns into a mask of steel as he scowls.

“I thought–” He raises his hand, and the ropes around your wrists burn and you stumble back involuntarily. “–I said no games.”

“I was asking a question,” you say, blowing a loose strand of hair out of your face, breathing heavily. “What makes you think I am privy to the details you wish to hear?”

He takes a step forward, menacingly, the sorcerers that surround you fall back. He is taller than you, which is strange for a mortal man. “Because, daughter of Caranthir,” he hisses, “One cousin of yours leads this foolish assault, and the other orchestrated it.”

You laugh again, though even to your ears it borders the edge of manic – the mention of your father’s name has given you an idea.

He raises a hand and you feel like you’ve been slapped with an iron bar. Warmth trickles down your cheek, and you are certain you hear a tooth crack. This only encourages your laughter.

“What makes you think they trust me?” You manage once your laughter has calmed some. That is not, entirely, true. But, for the sake of this moment, you are more than happy to play along.

“They are my half-cousins.” You emphasize the ‘half’ so well that you are certain your grandfather must be proud, though you never met him. “They are of the line of Fingolfin and Finarfin. Elven memories are long, and old wounds leave scars. They would never trust me with the information you want until the breaking of the world, if then.”

Gorothul is not pleased with the answer, and the ropes burn hotter.

“I see you insist on doing this the hard way.”

His eyes flash dangerously.

“Very well.”

He barks an order to the sorcerers and you are unbound, though you have no time to do anything before you are rebound to a wooden structure that looks almost like a bellows, save that there is no actual bellow inside the frame.

The world around you goes flickering in and out of focus, like you are adjusting a lens to examine a gem – startlingly close, then distant, and almost abstract.

The bite of the wood against the skin of your wrists. The crackle of fire in your ears. The throbbing of your cheek where Gorothul had struck you using his sorcery. The crack of leather against stone.

It will do you no good to be present for this.

You breathe and focus outward, into the distance.

Your mind is far away as the blows begin to fall.

You are in the courtyard of Caras Gelebren, in the days of its youth, before that charlatan ever appeared. You sit on the edge of a fountain, embroidery in your lap as the wind tugs your hair.

You draw breath as steadily as you can, focusing on the texture of the fabric beneath your fingers, and the steadiness of each stitch and the soothing choice of choosing each color -- blue, red, yellow, green, soft blue, purple -- and not the sting.

The Sorcerers move deliberately slow, leaving time between strikes for the quick stinging pain to be swallowed by the slow, agonizingly burning one, leaving time to wonder if they were done, time to hope that perhaps, just perhaps, there would be no following blow.

There is some cruel art twisted into the whip, because every strike feels like fire and darkness and you try to keep sewing, but the stitches blink out.

As the pain grows, you throw yourself further back.

Gone is the noontide of Caras Gelebren, and the fire on the air is the burning plains of the Bragollach, as you and your mother -- and recently father -- join your two youngest uncles at Amon Ereb.

The sky outside is dark, and you are scared most of the time but in your father's study, where it is warm and cozy and almost like home, you feel safe.

You are sprawled out on a rug in front of his desk, and your fingers tremble as you turn the page of your book. Upon the crown of Túna the city of the Elves was built, the white walls and terraces of Tirion; and the highest of the towers of that city was the Tower of Ingwë, Mindon Eldaliéva, whose silver lamp shone far out into the mists of the sea. In Tirion upon Túna the Vanyar and the Noldor dwelt long in fellowship.

You swallow the taste of ash as the strikes are drawn apart, though each time they connect, they are harder.

But the Noldor were beloved of Aulë, and he and his people came often among them. Great became their knowledge and their skill; yet even greater was their thirst for more knowledge, and in many things they soon surpassed their teachers.

The strikes slow.

You are on the banks of the Helevorn, the lake breeze ruffling your hair as you sit, your knees drawn to your chest. You are very young again, and the plains around you have not burned and the waters have not been defiled.

The pain grows louder now.

Your father's two middle brothers are visiting Thargelion, and they bring wonderful stories with them, and to your great delight, the older of the two had no qualms carrying you around on his shoulders for hours on end, or bringing you across the plains and teaching you to shoot or even hunt small game.

(Though, your mother is the one to have qualms about that at your age, since you barely came to your uncle's hip).

The pain burns across your shoulders.

A small mechanical bird is pressed into your hand. Your other uncle tells you to press the very small button on the top of its head, and to your delight, it whistles a short tune. You instantly adore the thing, and throw your arms around your uncle who casts your parents a smile and your parents exchange glances, though you didn't know why at the time.

The pain becomes a blaring noise that makes it harder and harder to think of anything else. You cannot control your breathing, you hear it, you feel it catching in your throat, uneven gasps and gulps--

Memory flares and skips, now coming in flashes like thunder over the distant hills.

“Hold the hammer like this," your cousin says, adjusting your grip. The heat of the forge startles you, making you lose your form, and you are barely up to his shoulder -- a visit before the Bragollach.

The haunted look on your father's face after the battle where you lost everything as you wander with your family among the woodlands.

“Look at how well this turned out!" Your cousin's voice is proud, as he hands you the small, slightly misshapen star you had chosen to make for your father for his begetting day. He assures you that for a first project, it was very good, and you could only get better.

Tumbling down a hill of grass as barking echoes in your ears as laughter bubbles up in your throat.

The frigid cold of the day that your uncle gave you back the necklace you made for your father since your father no longer could.

Your father, bent over a gash in your arm, carefully cleaning the rocky debris from the wound -- you'd taken a nasty fall off your gelding. When the gash is clean, he begins stitching the raw edges with careful tiny knots. He speaks to you, and his voice is soothing and gentle as you grip your mother's hand so tightly, your knuckles go white.

Ash falls from the sky as Beleriand sinks beneath your feet.

Gorothul -- you recognize the voice -- is counting the blows. You do not know the language, but the number sequence is unmistakable.

You cannot cast yourself out again, you are in too much pain but you decide the numbers will do as well as anything else and start counting.

X+1. X+2. X+3. X+4. X+5.

You let yourself be carried by the sequence, like a current of a river drifting you out to sea as the numbers turn into a graph in your mind.

X+15. X+20. X+25

The lines waver.

X+55.

The points bleed.

X+70--

You can no longer see your father's face.

#my fic #morinel #ask game reply tag #curufin gifting a small child a noisemaking machine is a declaration of war on caranthir actually LMFAO #hi yes thanks for checking in; i am still being mean as hell to morinel

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fromwilderlandtowesternshore · 1 year

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got to put morinel's concept art into action and ngl i'm a big fan of how it turned out

#morinel #my art #yes that's a caras gelebren screenshot from the wiki i'm Lazy lol #also found my tablet pen!!!

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minnieeeworld · 9 months

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my animatronic OCS !!!

#oc: olive #oc: morinelle #oc: dot #oc stuff #procreate #my art #digital art #tumblr art #artist support #original art #ocs #clowncore #kidcore #bjd #animatronic

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aseaunsettled · 4 months

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&&&. morinel's names.

Because Eldar have too many, and Morinel has opinions on all of them.

𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐥/𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐞. ( 𝐟𝐚𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫-𝐧𝐚𝐦𝐞). her father name was first given to her in quenya, though it was publicly announced in sindarin, and it means (roughly) 'dark-crowned star'. it refers to the fact she was born at night, with dark hair like her father's, and then as her eyes are grey, the starlight made her eyes look bright. very solid, middle of the road, doesn't call too much attention to her, she likes it. [the quenya nickname for this is morye which is very seldom used by her family since it is too close to 'moryo' which is her father's nickname.] 𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐰𝐞/𝐢𝐬𝐟𝐢𝐧. ( 𝐦𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫-𝐧𝐚𝐦𝐞 ). this alludes to her heiritage as one of the house of finwe and also eventually her interest in fibercraft. it means 'knowing-finwë'. made of the components 'ista' as a noun meaning “lore, knowledge” or a verb “to know” and the suffix 'finwë'. (which is further glossed as '“clever, skillful; fine, delicate; skill, dexterity”). the (quenya) nickname for this is istye, which is usually only used by family/very close friends. she does not use this name very often after the war of wrath, as she feels it has… political connotations.... that she would prefer to avoid, thank you very much. 𝐬𝐢𝐫𝐲𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐬/𝐬𝐢𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐭𝐡. ( 𝐚𝐟𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐚𝐦𝐞 ) 'siryanis' (river-woman). given to her by an aunt for her love of the gelion/rivers in general. it changes slightly to 'river-name' to fit the phonetics of sindarin a little better. (in her years of the trees 'verse, 'naltanare' (radiant-fire) takes the place of 'siryanis'. and she uses the combination of 'naltanare istafinwe' until it is time to translate her names into sindarin, in which she goes more by morinel.)

tldr;

morínellë istafinwë/morinel isfin - her name in quenya/sindarin until the war of wrath.

(her parents tend to use the quenya versions of her names in private, and occasionally in public, depending on how much of a fuck they gave about the quenya ban on any given day.)

morinel sireneth is how she will address/introduce herself post war of wrath.

of all many names she has, morinel is by far the one she prefers most.

istyë is a nickname only her family calls her.

her father also occasionally called her 'cirincë', which is a kind of red bird because she loved birds growing up and was also often dressed in red.

in her Years of the Trees AU, naltanárë takes the spot of most preferred name (she is Very Proud of it), and the nickname for that is naltyë (also only called by those close to her).

#❝ the song that i’d always sing ❞ → hcs/meta #❝ kindling for a little while ❞ → ooc; queue #i have no idea if 'morínellë' is actually conjugated correctly because i created it in sindarin first lmao #*it being the name 'morinel'

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sweetearthandnorthernsky · 2 months

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morinel for the alternate intros :D

morinel my beloved!

okay so most realistic is a variation on the helf intro, but i’m going to make it ✨different✨ because i can and also i feel like being mean.

so, you get a black screen, and the white text with: eregion, midwinter, 1697.

(listen—)

your character is in the Army that gil-galad ended up sending to help out, (not the one that is helped by numenor, just the elves of lindon, that hide in imladris) which ended up coming too late (but no one knows that yet).

the army is probably not *super* close to caras gelebren/ost-in-edhil, but close enough to see it burning in the distance.

the intro probably starts with you talking to A Friend before A Messenger tells you ‘hey, congrats, you got picked to go on this scouting mission, now go find morinel.’

when you find her, you note that she looks exhausted, like she hasn’t slept in several days probably but then neither have half the people in charge.

she tells you that she’s leading a little group to scope out the area before the whole rest of the army moves in, and she could use someone of your skill set. (+ bonus/special dialogue for champs&rks, probably)

she has you take a couple messages to a couple different people to Co-ordinate things probably (ft maybe elf politics) and to rest afterward. either the next day or several hours later, after you rest, it’s Time and you assemble at morinel’s lil tent.

you’re the first one there, which results in the the little combat tutorial. the dialogue is probably something to the effect of: hey, new person, you look nervous. want to deal with it by sparring?

once morinel is satisfied that you’re doing fine enough, she’s like. this is not going to be easy. it’s gonna suck. but we have to. slowly, the other people going with y’all filter in, and it’s time to head out.

a bit of a skip, you’re sorted into pairs, and, naturally, you’re paired with morinel and she tells you that the two of you have to be Real Careful ™ because eventually you’ll be going as close to the gates as you guys can.

you kill 0/8 orcs, and click the highlighted spots that are various “this path is not well guarded” “this area has lots of sentries” etc etc. yall end up getting REAL close to the gates.

then, ++++dread and morinel is like aw FUCK, and is like move/hide literally now or we’re SO doomed. (the two of you hide in a bush? in a tree? who knows, i don’t remember the hiding mechanics in game atm)

but just as you get out of sight—

BOOM!

the big gates open, and Mátshakha is striding out down the path (you don’t know this till much later, but she is very much on thin fucking ice with sauron rn). a bunch of orcs and high ranking banner guards following and you’re like oh okay. why were the refugees so—

and then there’s the banner :) made out of a whole elf :) which adds a lot more dread and then morinel is like we have to go NOW because we won’t be able to get out if we stay.

morinel debriefs you a bit, and you notice she’s real shaken but you don’t have much time to think about it.

this could cross fade to the present and end there and dump you out with bregolleth in swanfleet maybe OR segue into the Main Helf Intro in mordor, where morinel is either fulfilling a harthalín type role or just one of the npcs hanging out at the front of the alliance like cirdan, with maybe a quick little line of dialogue.

also. i am. unsure how much this actually follows the game lore of the fall of eregion/ost-in-edhil vs my own vs silm/HoME but. tis whatever. :)

#og post #ask game reply tag #morinel

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sweetearthandnorthernsky · 7 months

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so just pour a drink

oc-tober day one: tea (morinel, ft celebrimbor) look, i’m being nice to morinel & celebrimbor for. literally once in their lives💙

Caras Gelebren positively sparkles in the late afternoon of summer, and the tall marble towers are garlanded with flowers, and Morinel sighs contentedly, dismounting from Mithrad's back.

Summers in Eregion are always her favorite – partly because she cannot stand the humid air the shores of Lindon always seem to suffocate her with once the weather begins to warm and partly because she is, in some small part, glad to be in a place where whispers don't follow everywhere she goes -- though, to the Lindondrim's credit, those whispers have gotten very quiet in recent years.

When she finds a place in the stables for her beloved Mithrad (who eyes her with distaste as she leaves), she stretches and readjusts her pack. It’s not too full, among a spare change of clothes, it only contains her rations and her runekeeping supplies, and a handful of other trinkets as she heads to the room she's been staying in every summer since this arrangement began.

By the time she’s done washing and changing out of her traveling clothes into ones she left here last summer, the sun is starting to set and cast the city in the deep purple from the shadows of the mountains. She's tired -- she needs caffeine more than anything, right now, but it wouldn't be right to do anything without greeting her cousin and host first.

By the time Morinel makes it to the top of the stairs that lead to Celebrimbor’s study, her legs ache. At least in Lindon, Gil-galad and Elrond didn’t choose studies that were at the very top of the tallest tower in the city.

It’s easier to get to the roof! I get my best thinking done there, you know. Celebrimbor’s words echo in her head and she rolls her eyes affectionately at the memory.

Finally, she knocks at the open door frame of Celebrimbor’s study, and before Morinel knows it, Ungoleg darts out of the study, purring madly as she wraps herself around her legs. Celebrimbor doesn't look up, engrossed in a project at the work table in the corner of the room.

She sighs, glancing at the mess of shelves behind her cousin's main desk that looks more like a dovecote for paper birds than cubbies or shelves, filled with letters, documents, scrolls and books and sketches and schematics, and stranger items still: gems, jars of illegibly labeled substances, and even a set of robes.

It might be her imagination, but it seems ever so slightly neater than it was last summer.

She clears her throat and Celebrimbor looks up and she stifles a laugh -- there is a very large smudge of ink on his face, under his eye. He grins at her, waving her over to look at the new design schematics spread over his worktable. She listens to him as long as she is able, though, like always, he talks quick, and she can barely keep up when fully awake, let alone now.

Morinel sways a little, stumbling into the corner of the table, and his eyes soften, and asks if she would like to join him in the Dining Hall for some tea. She nods eagerly, and off they set.

The Mírdain, as always, is alive with activity. Those working toward a place among the Masters bustle past, on errands or between lectures, the apprentices distinguished by their white sashes and the journeymen by black. Little knots of people in conversation sat in low, square tables in the Dining Hall, drinking cups of holly tea, warmed by burning braziers as the two of them find a table of their own, with piping hot tea in cups and a bowl of candied citrus peels to sweeten the bitter holly tea. The Sun slowly dips behind the horizon, washing the hills with golds and reds and orange.

They discuss anything and everything: Celebrimbor excitedly tells her about Celebrian's most recent visit to Caras Gelebren and her rapidly growing skill in jewelcraft, and Morinel tells him in turn about the daily goings on in Lindon, and the new additions to the court's library.

When Celebrimbor notices that the table fire is slowly dying, he reaches into one of his sleeves and pulls out a packet of powder. She barely has time to process what it might be before he tosses it into the brazier. Flames leap up around the teapot in long tongues of blue and white. Morinel jerks back, nearly sloshing her holly tea down her tunic, swearing loudly.

Celebrimbor laughs and she shoots him a glare over the rim of her cup.

“You’re terrible,” she says, scowling. She takes a sip of her tea – it is still slightly too bitter, and she reaches for the candied orange peel to drop it into her tea. She sips it again – much better.

The fact it happened to have been the last orange peel in the bowl, leaving only lemon peels and lime peels, and caused the less-than-serious affront on her cousin's face is an added bonus.

"Hey!"

She sips from her tea again, pretending not to hear. The orange definitely helped, and she can feel her headache caused by lack of caffeine slowly slipping away, like the fading ebb of the tides.

"To be betrayed by my own cousin," he complains dramatically, "In my own halls, after I graciously offered--"

She rolls her eyes when his words are loud enough to make those of the Jewelsmiths turn to look at them. "Will you stop that?"

His eyes twinkle, and she knows that he's going to ask for something. "Only if you bring some of Cirdan's honey-cakes with you next summer."

She finds she can live with such a request and nods her head very gravely, as if she was being asked for a—

(No, even centuries later, that joke is bad taste, and still leaves a sour taste in her mouth—)

As if being asked for the keys to Lindon, is probably a better joke.

“Very well,” she sips from her tea and shuts her eyes.

Morinel smiles.

This is going to be a good summer.

#oc-tober 2023 #morinel #my fic #anyway dont @ me for being on a feanorian kick recently. i re-read these gifts you have given me and got EMOTIONAL abt 2nd gen feanorians #i also got sad writing ANYWAY because i know what happens Later/After this fic >:((((#also thank goodness for the q button bc today is gonna be ROUGH

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