LotR/Hobbit fic -- In the Service of the Elven King

[artaxastra]

A short gen story with Aragorn, Thranduil, and Gandalf. This takes place in the decades immediately after The Hobbit.

Comments

[paratti]

Loved it.

[artaxastra]

Thank you!

[tricksterquinn]

This is so very interesting! Not an angle I am used to seeing Thranduil from at all, but I can see that he might well like Aragorn. I like Gandalf's sharpness, Thranduil's hot-and-cold and the deceptive nature of both, and his tweaking of Gandalf (and oh, I wonder what THAT was about!). And I very much like Aragorn, sharp enough to pick up on so many subtle cues - the clenched fist, the minute reactions, the snark - and also wise enough, even at 22, not to believe he knows all the layers.

Did Legolas and Aragorn know one another before the Counil at Rivendell?

[artaxastra]

I'm glad you like it! A very different angle on Thranduil, yes. Absolutely he's hard-drinking (13 kegs is quite a keg party!) and vain, but he's a very competent king and one of the few Elven lords who managed to get out of the battles of the Last Alliance alive. (The only three named ones who survive are Thranduil, Elrond, and Celeborn.) He's definitely hot and cold -- I'm glad you like the deception! And he enjoys tweaking Gandalf. Certainly he knows something Aragorn doesn't!

Young Aragorn is fun. He is indeed very perceptive, and he's watching closely in this new environment, but he knows what he doesn't know. Also, he's grown up among elves, and he's more adept than most humans at reading their minute visual cues.

I think Legolas and Aragorn must have. Certainly in movieverse at least they're already friends, the way Legolas jumps to Aragorn's defense in the Council of Elrond scene and the casual way Aragorn talks to him. I think they've known each other a long time, at least in Aragorn's life terms of a long time

[baranduin]

Wonderful! Every bit of it, all three of them!

[artaxastra]

Thank you so very much!

[genarti]

I followed a rec from selenak, and I'm delighted I did -- this is lovely! I love how Aragorn is so young but still recognizably Aragorn, and how all three of them have very different personalities and perspectives but are still on the same side, and (more or less) friendly towards each other while guarding what they won't compromise about.

[artaxastra]

Thank you so much! It's interesting to write Aragorn that young. But he's still very perceptive and sees more than he shows. They do have such different perspectives and approaches, but yes, all on the same side. Which is challenging, I think, as a writer because readers often want it more cut and dried than that.

[carmencatalina]

This was wonderful - I especially like Thranduil's bitter words about the realities of war.

[artaxastra]

Thank you so much! I think it's important to remember that Thranduil has very good reasons for hanging back, rather than just not caring.