Drabble catch-up, and Input on narrative tense appreciated
Firstly, in resuming work on the ‘Natural Disasters’ Tolkien_Weekly challenge, I decided to assemble the whole series to date here in case readers forgot what the Void my drabble series was about during the month-long intermission (it’s about the siege and destruction of Utumno, and thus highlights shenanigans by some of my usual suspects).
Secondly, and bafflingly, the first drabble of this series is narrated in the past tense, and all subsequent drabbles in the present tense. Evidently I don't pay conscious attention to the narrative tense I employ in drabbles. Looking over things, it appears I’ve leaned more toward present tense since a series that I almost titled collectively ‘Palantíri Pals” (Saruman and Sauron both nixed that soundly and proceeded to deplore my existence).
So, I’ve a favor to ask. I can’t decide how to resolve the narrative tense inconsistency here. If anyone looking at my work from the outside has an opinion, please do chime in!
____________Author's Notes:
Angamando = Q. Angband
Mairon = Sauron's name of old
Valaraucar = Q. Balrogs
Kosomot = Q. Gothmog
Ungweliantë = Q. Ungoliant
Angoronti = Q. Iron Mountains, author's non-expert translation
_________________________________Fire Below the Mountains
As Angamando’s strength faltered, Utumno marched to its aid against the Valar. Desperate now, Aulë raised his hand against the peaks, thereby leveling Angamando. Melkor fell back, thinking to fortify Utumno against similar assault. His Valarauca rearguard left a searing wake, lashing scrub, tree, sparse grass. A wall of flame howled behind them in the uplands, stalling the enemy’s pursuit.
Mairon-most of his folk hidden, lost, dispersed-emerged from Angamando’s wreck and considered the ravaged lands, the miles-vast fire below the mountains, and Valinor’s host receding before him. Sparks of fatigue and ire kindled in his burnished gaze.
_________________________________Drought Manifest
Besieged Utumno bleeds lava, rains ash. Any overhead precipitation is obscured and evaporatively swallowed by the red-bellied smokes.
Aman’s host chafes in dry thirst yet gives no ground. Mairon, alone but for a small company, essays fruitlessly to push through to his lord’s citadel. He falls back and worries at his foe’s fringe, vindictive, fell, yet fearful for once of being subdued and captured.
Melkor is drought manifest, desiccated flesh, preferring the pain of it to the admittance of overmuch hated water unto his body; within Utumno, he feels not the rain’s absence but only that of his lieutenant.
_________________________________The Hated Element
Ulmo’s spies mingle with distant rivulets and wend painstakingly toward Utumno. Obscure deep and claustrophobic ways, magmatic impediments, sheer passages...
Glaurung lopes and jolts along the corridor, hunched, once-humanoid form slowly trending reptilian. He seeks the dungeons, another prisoner to bring atop the ramparts and rend before Valinor’s host, but pauses to note a dripping onto the floor.
Glaurung attacks Ulmo’s spy with what feeble flame he now possesses, but more pour down. He thrashes and steams as the corridor floods. Melkor, sensing the incursion of the hated element, summons several Valaraucar. A violent skirmish arises in the deep.
_________________________________Gnawed Bone-Close
Mairon harries still the hem of Aman’s host, but loyalty shan’t feed Utumno. Within, provisions are gnawed bone-close. Some of its folk, by habit or desire, are become bound to their forms, irrevocably. Glaurung chews claws and dead skin. Ungweliantë falls under guard, lest she consume others. Melkor, ignoring hunger, broods.
Mairon, beleaguered, returns to ruined Angamando to scrounge for weapons and potions, and mead. Nor do the elite of Utumno want for drink, there being still store of gin, rum, absinthe. This Melkor does not ignore. Kosomot tips back a cup to vengeance before returning to the ramparts.
_________________________________The Bitter Deed
Utumno, hungry but unmoved, regards Aman’s host. A monstrous crossbow visits the ramparts. Its bolt, trailing cable, reels in a winging eagle. Melkor’s captains, jeering behind shields, feast upon it.
Melkor will stand while Utumno stands. Raze it, Oromë urges, by union of all their devices, in cataclysm that will mutilate Arda if need be. They’ve no other option.
The Valar uplift their hands. Foremost in the bitter deed, Aulë beckons the neighboring tectonic plate. It lunges south, far beneath the Endórë plate and the Angoronti, rending bedrock, spitting magma.
Utumno quivers, then begins to break in smoke and flame.
_________________________________A Swift Spring
Melkor navigates seesawing corridors, speaking to calm the seismic chaos. He senses Utumno’s perimeters crumbling, yet he can maintain the deep places.
Manwë and Ulmo merge forces. Embracing into a gale, Eönwë and Ossë storm the fortress, bringing down arches, halls; Kosomot, intercepting them, is quenched.
A swift spring, Salmar darts into the deepest pits. Melkor greets him with tormenting strikes, yet his brief distraction is sufficient; Aulë’s hold tightens: the mountain overhead is altogether removed in eruption and quake.
A shaft opens above. Light enters, a lance, and Melkor grimaces in pain. Varda stands above. Tulkas beside her laughs.
_________________________________For a Glad World
Humbled Utumno is barren and still, until midges find their way in. The dank air above the waterlogged region pulses with them, harassing victor and defeated alike.
Prisoners of war curse them. Those searching the ruins for captives swat them. Melkor, hunched under Angainor, sneers, “Behold life in its glory.”
Three Eruhíni are brought up, marred nearly beyond recognition. Nienna and Estë and midges greet them.
Mairon hollers, “They are not for a glad world. Are you merciful? Kill them.” He evades pursuit as ever, near enough to be remembered, too far for any to read despair in his face.
Secondly, and bafflingly, the first drabble of this series is narrated in the past tense, and all subsequent drabbles in the present tense. Evidently I don't pay conscious attention to the narrative tense I employ in drabbles. Looking over things, it appears I’ve leaned more toward present tense since a series that I almost titled collectively ‘Palantíri Pals” (Saruman and Sauron both nixed that soundly and proceeded to deplore my existence).
So, I’ve a favor to ask. I can’t decide how to resolve the narrative tense inconsistency here. If anyone looking at my work from the outside has an opinion, please do chime in!
____________Author's Notes:
Angamando = Q. Angband
Mairon = Sauron's name of old
Valaraucar = Q. Balrogs
Kosomot = Q. Gothmog
Ungweliantë = Q. Ungoliant
Angoronti = Q. Iron Mountains, author's non-expert translation
_________________________________Fire Below the Mountains
As Angamando’s strength faltered, Utumno marched to its aid against the Valar. Desperate now, Aulë raised his hand against the peaks, thereby leveling Angamando. Melkor fell back, thinking to fortify Utumno against similar assault. His Valarauca rearguard left a searing wake, lashing scrub, tree, sparse grass. A wall of flame howled behind them in the uplands, stalling the enemy’s pursuit.
Mairon-most of his folk hidden, lost, dispersed-emerged from Angamando’s wreck and considered the ravaged lands, the miles-vast fire below the mountains, and Valinor’s host receding before him. Sparks of fatigue and ire kindled in his burnished gaze.
_________________________________Drought Manifest
Besieged Utumno bleeds lava, rains ash. Any overhead precipitation is obscured and evaporatively swallowed by the red-bellied smokes.
Aman’s host chafes in dry thirst yet gives no ground. Mairon, alone but for a small company, essays fruitlessly to push through to his lord’s citadel. He falls back and worries at his foe’s fringe, vindictive, fell, yet fearful for once of being subdued and captured.
Melkor is drought manifest, desiccated flesh, preferring the pain of it to the admittance of overmuch hated water unto his body; within Utumno, he feels not the rain’s absence but only that of his lieutenant.
_________________________________The Hated Element
Ulmo’s spies mingle with distant rivulets and wend painstakingly toward Utumno. Obscure deep and claustrophobic ways, magmatic impediments, sheer passages...
Glaurung lopes and jolts along the corridor, hunched, once-humanoid form slowly trending reptilian. He seeks the dungeons, another prisoner to bring atop the ramparts and rend before Valinor’s host, but pauses to note a dripping onto the floor.
Glaurung attacks Ulmo’s spy with what feeble flame he now possesses, but more pour down. He thrashes and steams as the corridor floods. Melkor, sensing the incursion of the hated element, summons several Valaraucar. A violent skirmish arises in the deep.
_________________________________Gnawed Bone-Close
Mairon harries still the hem of Aman’s host, but loyalty shan’t feed Utumno. Within, provisions are gnawed bone-close. Some of its folk, by habit or desire, are become bound to their forms, irrevocably. Glaurung chews claws and dead skin. Ungweliantë falls under guard, lest she consume others. Melkor, ignoring hunger, broods.
Mairon, beleaguered, returns to ruined Angamando to scrounge for weapons and potions, and mead. Nor do the elite of Utumno want for drink, there being still store of gin, rum, absinthe. This Melkor does not ignore. Kosomot tips back a cup to vengeance before returning to the ramparts.
_________________________________The Bitter Deed
Utumno, hungry but unmoved, regards Aman’s host. A monstrous crossbow visits the ramparts. Its bolt, trailing cable, reels in a winging eagle. Melkor’s captains, jeering behind shields, feast upon it.
Melkor will stand while Utumno stands. Raze it, Oromë urges, by union of all their devices, in cataclysm that will mutilate Arda if need be. They’ve no other option.
The Valar uplift their hands. Foremost in the bitter deed, Aulë beckons the neighboring tectonic plate. It lunges south, far beneath the Endórë plate and the Angoronti, rending bedrock, spitting magma.
Utumno quivers, then begins to break in smoke and flame.
_________________________________A Swift Spring
Melkor navigates seesawing corridors, speaking to calm the seismic chaos. He senses Utumno’s perimeters crumbling, yet he can maintain the deep places.
Manwë and Ulmo merge forces. Embracing into a gale, Eönwë and Ossë storm the fortress, bringing down arches, halls; Kosomot, intercepting them, is quenched.
A swift spring, Salmar darts into the deepest pits. Melkor greets him with tormenting strikes, yet his brief distraction is sufficient; Aulë’s hold tightens: the mountain overhead is altogether removed in eruption and quake.
A shaft opens above. Light enters, a lance, and Melkor grimaces in pain. Varda stands above. Tulkas beside her laughs.
_________________________________For a Glad World
Humbled Utumno is barren and still, until midges find their way in. The dank air above the waterlogged region pulses with them, harassing victor and defeated alike.
Prisoners of war curse them. Those searching the ruins for captives swat them. Melkor, hunched under Angainor, sneers, “Behold life in its glory.”
Three Eruhíni are brought up, marred nearly beyond recognition. Nienna and Estë and midges greet them.
Mairon hollers, “They are not for a glad world. Are you merciful? Kill them.” He evades pursuit as ever, near enough to be remembered, too far for any to read despair in his face.