What happens next? The Valar don’t seem to do capital punishment, so I assume they would not be executed.
Maedhros feared that the Valar would keep the Silmarils, but we don’t know for sure if they would or not. Eonwe only says that he can’t make the decision, it has to go to Valinor. If it had, there is at least a chance that they might have received pity and mercy, even if Maedhros did not expect that.
Possibilities:
1) The Valar return the Silmarils as a peace gesture and exile them to, say, Formenos. Maybe Maglor was right after all, and it is purely Feanor’s distrust of the Valar speaking through Maedhros that caused their final downfall.
I wonder if Maedhros would have killed himself anyway? Probably.
2) The Valar hand over the Silmarils and banish Maedhros and Maglor to Middle-earth. I think probably canon then proceeds uninterrupted.
3) The Valar hand over the Silmarils and give Maedhros & Maglor long-term oath recovery & burns therapy in the Gardens of Lorien. Nerdanel and Finrod visit with cake for their begetting days. Somehow this doesn’t seem very likely to me but I can’t say it’s impossible.
4) The Valar keep the Silmarils and Maedhros and Maglor are disarmed and securely contained somehow for the rest of time. They might be tempted to try to fulfil their oath or be tormented by it at some future date, but the Valar practice Constant Vigilance and so they never get a chance. I find the idea of eternal vigilance by the Valar a little unlikely, but I suppose it’s possible.
This version might be pretty sad for Nerdanel who is probably going to see her children being driven into torments by their Oath.
Possibly slightly less sad version: they still get Oath Therapy to help the itch for silmarils and occasional visits from friends and family, though probably the need for Constant Vigilance would restrict the visits somewhat, this version might work out more or less OK.
5) Maedhros’s fear is real: the Valar keep the Silmarils, but do not sufficiently contain Maedhros & Maglor for the rest of time. Eventually, as happened repeatedly in Beleriand, they find they are unable / unwilling to ignore the Oath, and try to take the Silmarils by force. Both of them are pretty impressive individuals with a lot of war experience, Valinor is at peace. I think they’d lose, but it would probably all get very messy and unpleasant.
Are there other possibilities?
The only good outcome seems to be number 1 above. I sort of hate to think about the others, because under all of the rest, it seems safer for all concerned that they not surrender.
I’m sorry, anon 😦 I hope you find more stories to connect to like that in the future.
-mod Pi
This happened to me recently too. I’ve only had my AO3 account for about a year, but I’ve been a reader for quite a bit longer than that. I had bookmarked all of my favourite works in my browser, and ever since becoming a member myself, have been (very) slowly going through all of the works that I had saved, trying to rebookmark the ones I really love, and give extra kudos or comments, only to find that one of my favourite authors with one of my favourite fics had very recently decided to delete their account.
Whatever their reasons for deleting must have been valid, and I respect their decision entirely, and I hope that they are okay.
It’s definitely been a huge bummer ever since I found that out though. I’ll never get to read one of my favourite fics again, and that kind of sucks, but again, it’s worth it if their decision has improved whatever their situation was. I was so desperate that I had also looked in the wayback machine, but couldn’t find them.
I deal with some pretty bad anxiety which has prevented me from commenting in the past. It’s something that I’ve been making a big effort to change lately. I only wish I had showed them my support before they left, to at least hopefully have been able to leave on a bit of a brighter note. I know I’m only one person and likely wouldn’t have changed anything, but just knowing how much someone likes your work can mean a lot and wish I had done something sooner.
This is why, even though I’m not that happy with some of my earlier work anymore, I’d rather not delete them. Even if I wish I’d done a better job with those fics, there are still people out there who enjoy them, and I don’t want to take that away from them. This is not a criticism of that author – I agree that if deleting their account was important to them, then they needed to take that step -, it’s just that this reinforced my decision not to delete my old fics.
Also, thank you for the reminder to download my favorites on AO3. I would hate not being able to read them again. And thank you for commenting now – I’m sure your comments make those authors happy. 🙂
I never delete fanfic stories, even if I find them embarrassing or I now hate their premise, or characters, or interpretation of the canon. Someone out there reads them and likes them! Even the ones with only a few hundred clicks.
the best part of that story in context is that before they pull out their dicks, hemingway spends the better part of a chapter physically describing fitzgerald in great detail, claiming to be grossed out by him but obviously, obviously uncomfortably attracted
oh my god, it got better. I just went to find an excerpt and
Scott was a man then who looked like a boy with a face between handsome and pretty. He had very fair wavy hair, a high forehead, excited and friendly eyes and a delicate long-lipped Irish mouth that, on a girl, would have been the mouth of a beauty. His chin was well built and he had good ears and a handsome, almost beautiful, unmarked nose. This should not have added up to a pretty face, but that came from the coloring, the very fair hair and the mouth. The mouth worried you until you knew him and then it worried you more.
ernest hemingway calm down and control your thirst a little
“The mouth worried you until you knew him and then it worried you more“ is a hell of a line
Heartofoshun's place 