comforting signs right next to each other

suriquesse:

rosengreen:

Requested by @selkiebycatch who also has absolutely amazing headcanons on the subject, here are some headcanons about what makes Arda and Valinor otherworldly and magical. 

1. Enchanted orchards of Valinor: I headcanon that much of Valinor is quite rural and there is a wide range of climates within a relatively small world. Vast, roaming countryside and meadows dotted with hidden homes and workshops of the Noldor. Clotheslines dotted with handmade, colorful garments are sometimes the only sign of elven life there. 
One thing that this allows for is large, seemingly abandoned self containing gardens and orchards. There are apple and pear orchards hidden behind ivy covered walls and always filled with Autumn breezes. Enchanted light made it one of the only places not affected by the Darkening. 
There are citrus orchards always kept warm and bright lined with lemon trees and deep green grass. Except for the Maia who tend them, the only beings who enter the orchards are elves who do so, usually by mistake. 

2. There are places throughout Valinor and Arda where the Music was not loud enough. They can be the size of a footstep or a field and are not fully connected to the space time continuum. Those who tread on them will end up elsewhere in time or space and will never realize what had happened. 

3. In the great expanses of unexplored Valinor, there are coves, glens, lagoons, and all sorts of other places that seem shift and change, being there one day and not the next. Even while walking through familiar, charted territory, there is always the possibility of ending up in a hidden clearing, covered in hanging mosses and with strange lights all around. 

(Will add more soon!)

(Thank you so much for writing them, they are great!!♡)

 Some adventurous young elves sneaking into the permanent warm autumn, laughter, dry crunchy leaves, warm tree bark. They share a bottle of honeyed cider, two of them share a kiss. They are caught in carefree drowsiness when the lights start to mingle, and at first it seems to them that the firmament came alive but- attracted by the natural light lingering between the leaves, countless fireflies begin to move, to dance, and it’s hypnotizing…
Yavanna’s maiar aren’t too happy to find the equivalent of a drunkenly passed out student group in their well-hidden garden.

(And ahhh, I love the shifting-places and holes-in-the-music things!!)

 Aman seems smaller than Endor, but that’s not quite true.
Celegorm leaves with Orome’s hunting party for weeks, and they roam through forests that seem to become larger, over fields the elves think they know, but then- they stand on an empty hill where Tirion should be, and the hours pass differently. And Celegorm thinks he feels something familiar in the wind, Huan sniffs – and Nerdanel, on the way to her workshop, smells leather and wet dog amidst the city.

 There are maiar who are tasked to dance through the fabrics of reality to make sure that the elves who accidently step through the holes left by silence make it home safely. It’s mostly elflings who get lost – as they grow up, elves learn how to sing while they wander, to see where their voices sound “hollow”, as they don’t weave into the Great Theme.

 (It’s why elvish singers are called mighty: the most skilled ones, and those who learned under Nessa, can effortlessly step in and out of these holes. Among the edain it is told that elves move with otherworldly grace in battle, and “otherworldly” they are while avoiding hits.)

 Some elves find these not-quite-there places and feel a sense of belonging. They stay, alone or with their beloved, and- it can be very mundane, actually.
“Oh look, if that isn’t Auntie Elleth, whose house conveniently appears during every harvest celebration, but whenever I need someone to watch the kids? Not a trace!”