elennalore

I didn't post an update last Sunday, but since the last update, I have finished writing the MSV exchange fic. I already got it back from the beta reader. After that, I did the final editing and just now I POSTED IT in the collection! A victory!
I really enjoyed writing for the pairing (to be revealed later...). Might return writing about them later.
The MSV archive will open on April 11.

I'm taking part in My Slashy Valentine exchange again this year. This is my fourth year! It's an anonymous fic exchange, and I decided not to ask to whom I'm writing even though that would have been possible (and I still need to before posting it on Ao3). However, after getting the assignment, I actually have a good guess who the recipient will be.
My fic is going to be long! The minimum word count is 1200 words – I'm now at 3700 and the fic is not even close to the ending. It looks like it'll become a TRSB length fic. The pairing is not any I have written for MSV before, which feels actually fresh and inspiring. (I'm not going to tell more about the pairing or the setting to keep it secret...)
The DL for veteran participants is April 4, so I still have plenty of time finishing this story, even with the everyday RL duties.
I think I could post here a weekly progress report as a spur for myself.

Day 19 of SWG 30-Day Character Study. My character is Mairon | Sauron | Annatar.

Today's prompt: Strong Points, Part Two. Revisit the list of strengths you’ve thought about for Prompt 3. This time, write a scene in which your character’s strong points cause them trouble.

Here's my entry for Prompt 3 from before. The prompt I chose from my list was He cares about things and is capable of love. The result was a Silvergifting ficlet (300+ words) where Mairon's love complicates his plans.

You can read it on SWG!

 Looks like I haven’t really been active here anyway. But I’m reading a queer romantasy book I really enjoy, A Marvellous Light by Freya Marske.

I continued the SWG 30-Day Character Study!

Day 16 of SWG 30-Day Character Study. My character is Mairon | Sauron | Annatar.

Today's prompt: Down Memory Lane, Part Three. Imagine your character keeping a box of little mementoes that are important to them. Write a list, make a sketch, or create a fanwork where these mementoes feature.

I drew Annatar's box of memories he kept locked in his room in Ost-in-Edhil. The list of items:

- a collection of Celebrimbor's notes, and notes and diagrams they have made together
- an unused love potion (it wasn't needed, after all)
- Celebrimbor's handkerchief
- a ring and a bracelet Celebrimbor gave to Annatar as a gift
- an amethyst rock from Mordor
- a vial of molten lava from Sauron's forge in Mordor, sealed with magic
- a lock of Melkor's hair he gave to Mairon as a keepsake before sending him away

Happy New Year 2026!

For some time, I've felt like that fic writing won't come as easily to me as before, and I've allowed myself to not write if I feel like it. After S&D 2025, there was actually a month when I didn't write anything, but then I returned writing with a new chapter for my FCL-Silm crossover, and an entry for a SWG monthly challenge, Cinnamon Rolls, which is romantic fluff about Mairon/Eönwë. (I decided there are too few fics about that pairing.)

As the New Year was approaching, I felt ready to take a break from my writing hobby, content to be reading fic instead, but the SWG challenge prompts did it again: I found myself starting a new fic already today.

It's nothing much, only a short entry for one of the last year's SWG monthly challenges I can still pick as New Year's Resolution amnesty, but it's about Maedhros, whom I don't write very often even though he's one of my favourite characters, and it feels like Maedhros might give me a fresh start for this writing year.

I finished and posted a fic!
Vacation does wonders to a person.

Day 15 of SWG 30-Day Character Study. My character is Mairon | Sauron | Annatar.

Today's prompt: Big Ideas, Part Two. Using one of the big ideas from Prompt 14, revise an existing fanwork so that this idea is more strongly emphasized or create a new fanwork that brings this idea to the center of the piece.

I took the idea of Mairon as a muse - Mairon wants to inspire! I think that Mairon inspired not only Celebrimbor, but also Melkor. In fics, Melkor often calls him "Little Flame", which could be seen symbolically as the flame of inspiration.

I returned to my day 3 drabble and wrote a related drabble from Melkor's perspective, using the idea of Mairon as muse.

You can read in on SWG!

I finished writing and editing my fic for My Slashy Valentine exchange. I had a good time writing it as I happen to like the pairing a lot, and can't wait for it to be published on Valentine's day. I asked for an extension I thought I might need because of busy time IRL. I wouldn't have needed it, in the end, but now Ao3 has an issue, and their downtime is extended, or the site won't load for me, so I'm glad that I have that extension in case I'm not able to post it this evening because of that issue.

I wish I could tell you more about the fic, but I can't until the recipient has got it. Let me just say that it's the longest one I've written since TRSB.

Day 12 of SWG 30-Day Character Study. My character is Mairon | Sauron | Annatar.

Today's prompt: Down Memory Lane, Part Two. Think about the rites of passage your character went through. These can be mundane things like learning to walk, their first kiss, or taking an exam; formal ceremonies like a coming-of-age ritual, graduation or wedding; or life-changing events. Which steps did your character take on the way to who they are?

According to Wikipedia, a rite of passage is a ceremony or ritual of the passage which occurs when an individual leaves one group to enter another. It involves a change of status in society. This definition in mind, I'll make a list of such events in Mairon's life.

1. Entering into Eä
Not all Ainur entered into the created universe, but Mairon was among those who did. (We never hear about those other Ainur). This connects him to the world in a fundamental level. It's an irreversible step and connects him to the Arda until the end of the world.

2. Joining Melkor
This is a step that changes Mairon's whole narrative, and turns him, previously the "golden boy" of the Ainur, an outcast and an enemy. He leaves his old life behind, severing all contact with those who were important to him. He never seems to regret his radical choice (unless briefly when meeting with Eönwë in the aftermath of the War of Wrath).

3. Leaving Melkor
This is another important milestone in Mairon's life. There is some debate on when this happens. Did he flee and hide from Melkor's scorn and wrath after Lúthien and Huan defeated Mairon in Tol-in-Gaurhoth, as some people think, or did he eventually return to Melkor so that they were only separated when Melkor was imprisoned in the War of Wrath? My personal headcanon is the latter option, but the text sources can really be read either way. In any case, after this step, Mairon starts to operate as an independent agent, instead of serving someone else. A big step for a Maia. It seems that this is also an extremely difficult step for him, for it takes hundreds of years for him to do anything worth mentioning.

4. Becoming Annatar
Mairon was a shapeshifter and master of disguise, but at this point, he tries something completely new: to maintain a disguise and a persona for hundreds of years in a hostile (for him) environment to achieve his goals. My headcanon, as a Silvergifting shipper, is that this period, and especially his relationship with Celebrimbor, involuntarily changed his character in ways he had not expected. I think that this was the time of his greatest personal development – first for the good, and then, for the worse. But the worse part is linked to the next, crucial step.

5. Creating the One Ring
I always read it so that the One Ring has a part of Mairon's spirit in it. The Ring is a part of him, and by creating it, he does something to himself, an alteration that can be seen as distortion and breaking of his psyche. He also becomes obsessed with his initial plan and loses his ability for empathy and love.

6. Losing his ability to take a fair form
Mairon's body was destroyed in the downfall of Númenor, but he fled in spirit. However, he was never able to take a beautiful form again. This must have hit him hard, for from this point on, he stopped calling himself Mairon. He knew he wasn't "the admirable one" anymore.

7. The Ring destroyed
Together with the Ring, the whole of Sauron's realm in Mordor collapsed and his weakened spirit was blown away. This can be seen as the ultimate death of the Maia once known as Mairon. It was the end – or was it? Some fans, and fanfic writers, don't think so, but continue his story even from here.

8. New life in Valinor
This is full headcanon and fanon territory, but some fanfic writers (myself included) like to think that Sauron's spirit survived the cataclysm. Most often, he ends in Valinor in some form or other (a spirit, a cat, an eldritch monster, or his previous admirable self). It's the time of new beginnings and second changes. Thankfully, Elves can be re-embodied, and the Door of Night may open some day.