Kin-strife fic! Yay!
anonymous
April 6 2009, 23:46:10 UTC
Aradan is a piece of work! I like the way you used Valacar's POV first, and let us see his surprise at Aradan's ruthlessness, and also the way in whic Aradan somewhat downplays his own bigotry by saying he's just putting all the options on the table.
Turning around and then allowing us to see Aradan through his own eyes as he tries to persuade Vidumavi to step down or to travel to Gondor lets us see the split in him. He knows that evils will come to Gondor if Vidumavi mounts the throne as Queen and bears the royal heirs; he knows she is the one woman Gondor in its gluttony needs; and yet in the end, he can only couch the coming disaster in terms of her own stubbornness rather than the moral depravity of Gondor, which Vidumavi sees all too clearly.
And woo hoo! More Kin-strife fic! There is not enough of it.
Wonderful mix of characterisation and politics here - Romendacil disappointed and annoyed by his son's marriage to a Northern princess; but still man of conscience who refuses the expedient choice of having his pregnant daughter-in-law killed; Aradan who sees the high quality of the woman at the center of the drama but is perhaps too much reliant on expediency to completely understand her, and Vidumavi herself, a strong and proud woman who will not be bullied or bought.
I do think that Romendacil had the right idea that the child should have been born in Gondor; Valacar should have brought his bride home before the pregnancy.
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Turning around and then allowing us to see Aradan through his own eyes as he tries to persuade Vidumavi to step down or to travel to Gondor lets us see the split in him. He knows that evils will come to Gondor if Vidumavi mounts the throne as Queen and bears the royal heirs; he knows she is the one woman Gondor in its gluttony needs; and yet in the end, he can only couch the coming disaster in terms of her own stubbornness rather than the moral depravity of Gondor, which Vidumavi sees all too clearly.
And woo hoo! More Kin-strife fic! There is not enough of it.
Dwim
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I do think that Romendacil had the right idea that the child should have been born in Gondor; Valacar should have brought his bride home before the pregnancy.
Aradan is rather a nasty sort, isn't he...
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