Icon by @ThatSpookyAgent. Call me Tir or Julian. 37. He/They. Queer. Twitter: @tirlaeyn. ao3: tirlaeyn. 18+ Only. Star Trek. The X-Files. Sandman. IwtV. OMFD. Definitionless in this Strict Atmosphere.
Since in canon hobbits are good at hinding and finding things, and their home is generally considered a paradise to other races for its peace and prosperity, I think it would be a fun little thing if for some reason Maglor ended up just being hidden in the Shire and accepted there despite being Unfortunately Tall and allowed to heal
Like maybe, when the Shire was being settled a group of Hobbits continued westward just to scope out how safe their land would be, and happen upon the shores enjoying the sound of distant singing. They set up camp and unfortunately didn’t realize the tide was coming in until it was too late and are all scrambling and crying out for help as one of their party gets washed away to sea.
Maglor, who was nearby but didn’t notice these tiny sneaks until the screaming started, rushes up and in a panic and sees what he thinks are a group of children (with pointed ears, he can’t see their large feet under the water and sand, and thinks they’re Elven) alone and Drowning and thinks “not again” and dives in to save them
Which he does, but he’s had 4 thousand years of malnutrition, lack of care for his body and mind, and has his wounded hand that is black and scarred, which he had to use to pull these young ones to shore. Once everyone is saved he collapses to the ground, exhausted and unconscious.
The Hobbits, of course, can’t just let their savior stay on the beach like this where he could also drown or be swept off to sea, and they MUST thank him for the life debt, so they carry him to their pony cart and head back to the Shire where they can give him a proper thank you
Maglor is out cold for weeks though, long enough to be brought back to the Shire and situated in one of the guest rooms in the newly built Great Smial of the Took Clan. They clean him, bandage and heal his wounds, put him in some hastily made Tall Folk clothes made out of bedsheets, and wait for him to wake.
When he does, he’s in a panic and then confused, for he’s never seen hobbits before, and under the fear and dread he’s a little amused. All throughout the First and Second ages he’s managed to avoid others and has never been kidnapped, yet here he is, at the mercy of folk that look like children.
Some things get lost in translation between Hobbitish, Westeron, and Sindarin, and Maglor thinks that he’s now a prisoner to these small people, and the Hobbits think that they are going to care for him and have him be a guest of theirs for as long as he likes. Maglor, who hasnt had great mental health for the past 2 ages, agrees to be their prisoner, for honestly, he believes he deserves it.
So he heals, and once he heals (minus the blackened hand which gets medicated and wrapped and secured under a leather glove which reminds him of his eldest brother and he grieves) they put him to work. Or well, they allow him to help in their gardens, to sing songs of the sun, of joy and family and all things Hobbit. They let him help in the kitchen, where he shares recipes long since lost to the sands of time, and he helps them build a forge and how to do basic metal working, for even if his craft is one of voice and song, he is still his father’s son and a Prince of the Noldor- he knows how to use a forge.
And time moves on. They build him his own smial, one that suits his height, and Maglor heals, both in mind and in body, and he goes from not wanting to escape his captors because he deserves enslavement to finding a second family amongst these folk. He gets adopted into the Took Clan, and the Hobbits all affectionately call him “Old Maggie Took” or “Songbird” or if his singing is particularly a little to loud a little too early in the morning “that damned Rooster”
He helped protect the Hobbits, weaving Songs of illusion around their home, fighting Goblins and Orcs off with Bandobras Took, making daggers and leather gear for Belladonna Took as she travels the world, and trying his best to fight off the wolves during the Fell Winter. Not as many Hobbits die to fang and claw that winter, but they did to cold and starvation and sickness.
After Belladonna and her husband died that winter, her young son Bilbo often spent time with him (mostly to escape the well wishers and their looks of pity) and so Maglor taught him things to keep his mind from loss. Taught him Quenya, and Sindarin, all about the Noldor, about Elves and Men of old, what little he knew of Dwarves from Maedhros and Caranthir, and when Bilbo asks in a quite voice, how it feels to be the only one of his family members left
He, and the whole of the Shire really, also play a very fun game of Keep Away with Gandalf whenever he visits, and while he knows Something Is Up with the Shire, he never found out about Maglor (even though he has heard about Maggie Took, and all her apparent namesakes)
While Maglor wasn’t there to see Bilbo off on his own adventure he was able to make sure that when he came home it was to a home at all, even if some silverware did go missing. And when he sensed something fowl lingering in Bagend after his return, Maglor just brushed it off as something tainted from a dragon horde (later he weeps for how wrong he was and all the lives lost that he could have prevented if he investigated more)
And when Bilbo goes off to Rivendell, old and grey, all those years later guided by his dwarves, he has a silent, nervous, elven companion with him.
And its not the first or last time Elrond was grateful for the nature of Hobbits, but he wept tears of joy as he hugged his father nonetheless
Crack take on this: Hobbits are so good at finding that everything that other people lose or throw away winds up there sooner or later.
Blue wizards? Check.
Silmaril? Yup, sitting in that one mathom house.
Palantir? Got a couple of ‘em in the garden out back, they look pretty on their little stands.
Hobbits are resistant to the wiles of evil magic by dint of constant, low-grade exposure. Their picturesque little idyll of a Shire is MIddle-Earth’s trash heap. Gandalf is not charmed by their rustique but morbidly fascinated by how they survive… that. The odds of Maggie Took being a hobbit housewife or a fearsome relic of the last god-war are about 1 in 2. Gandalf does not ask questions anymore.
Listen the hobbits just having the Blue Wizards is so funny to me like imagine the fury Gandalf would have if he found out??
“What are you two doing here??? I thought you went East??!”
“Well, we did, then we found these delightful little people and went back west with them”
“So you’ve been here for 4 thousand years??? Why didn’t you say anything??? We could have used your help!”
“Well, we thought we were helping? Keeping this little pocket of paradise safe. You won’t believe the amount of things that pop up here, have you seen their mathom museum??? They needed us and its not like you ever asked to speak with us either. We lived with the Brandybucks, its not like we were hiding.”
“They needed you?? What on Arda could the peaceful folk of the Shire need with Two of Estë’s Maiar for???”
They show him the two palinter that were thought to be lost the northern sea, a fallen star that suspiciously shines with the light of the Two Trees, a helm that has a dragon figure down the middle, a sword as black as night that makes the very air around it feel cursed, and a few Dwarven Rings Of Power
“Is that it! Have these good people been hiding anything else of value that has been lost that I should know about??”
Maglor just sheepishly waves his burnt hand and Gandalf just
I want to hear Garak’s thoughts on
“He that breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom.”
‘i did not even want him’ well there’s a faramir mood
this is SUCH a writing mood omg
Strider did this to him too, wayyyyy back when. Just showed up there in Bree, smoking in the corner. Refused to leave or let the story go on without him.
Maybe it’s a Númenorean thing. XD
@lorata with some excellent Tolkien commentary over here
I love that this is a universal experience among writers.
Petition to rename RotK “Return of That Weirdo in the Tavern, I Don’t Know Who He Is or Why He’s Here.”
It’s important that the ponies were all safe tho.
This is literally the best post I have ever seen on tumblr.
I will never not reblog the fact that the Good Professor himself was a plot pantser. He was a masterful world-builder, but plotter, outliner? Nope!
You know, that makes me feel oddly reassured about my own writing endeavours
shout out to Karl Urban as Eomer for giving one of the most heart wrenching cries ever produced in cinematic history where you can essentially feel the anguish and shock that he is going through to find that his sister was on the battlefield, and is now injured, presumably dead. words cannot describe his pain.
Think about this for a moment. To him, she was never supposed to be there. She rode out of Rohan in secret with him, while he thought he’d left her - really the only family he has left - safely at home to lead the people.
They also changed his shooting schedule after this shot to add him to some of the scenes where Eowyn was in the House of Healing. They’d expected something more downplayed - shocked, and upset, but fairly stoic, like a stereotypical fantasy hero man - but they said when they saw this display of emotion, they couldn’t imagine him not being there watching over her heal.
One thing that really makes me mad about the movies is that half of the best speeches are stolen from Eomer in the books. Théoden’s warcry of “Death!” at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields was actually made by Eomer after he found out that Théoden had died and he was now in command. He was also smart and charming, but overall the Eomer of the books was emotional and very much listened to his heart over anything else.
Karl Urban is a phenomenal actor, and I really feel like he understood the character of Eomer as he was represented in the books. And I love that.
