The Fledgling years

by Soledad

Series: Prequel to “Innocence” – a young Lindir story.

Disclaimer: The characters, the context and the main plot belong to Professor Tolkien, whom I greatly admire. I’m only trying to fill in the gaps he so graciously left for us, fanfic writers, to have some fun.

Rating: G

Foreword

This story practically retells in a detailed version what Radagast told Elrond and Celebrían at the beginning of “Innocence”. Hints and bits have been given in other stories, so that my regular readers already pretty much know everything that there is to know about my version of Lindir. Nevertheless, I felt the necessity to write this prequel. Regardless of how long “Innocence” might finally become, it would be incomplete without telling the tale of Lindir’s childhood.

For new readers, I have to emphasize, that Lindir’s whole story and background are my doing. In LOTR, he is just a random elf who teases Bilbo about his poem sung in the chapter “Many Meetings”.

About the Istari: it is said in canon that:

“they first appeared in Middle-earth about the year of 1000 of the Third Age, but for long they went about in simple guise, as it were of Men already old in years but hale in body, travellers and wanderers, gaining knowledge of Middle-earth and all that dwelt therein, but revealing to none their powers and purposes. In that time Men saw them seldom and heeded them little. But as the shadow of Sauron began to grow and take shape again, they became more active, and sought ever to contest the growth of the Shadow, and to move Elves and Men to beware of their peril.”

(Unfinished Tales, Part Four, II. The Istari; p. 405.)

For the purposes of my story, “Innocence”, I assumed that while the Istari did not appear openly before Elves and Men ere the year 1000, they might have arrived a lot earlier (in this case in the first century of the Third Age) and wandered and worked unnoticed. Canon also states that they did not come over the Sea all at the same time. Saruman and Radagast came first, the Blue Wizards followed, and Gandalf arrived last, alone. It is not told how much time went by between their arrivals. It could have been days, months, years – or centuries. I chose the last option.

Also, I decided to make one of the Blue Wizards female. I know that it was probably not what Tolkien had in mind for them, but again, he also created the Valier who were not an inch less in majesty and power than their male counterparts. And he also created the Maia Arien, Mistress of the Sun. Why no female Istari, then?

In any case, people who have already forgotten more about Tolkien’s languages than I will ever be able to learn told me that “Alatar” could, theoretically, be as much a female name as a male one. Nonetheless, I chose to call the female wizard Alatariel while still in Valinor and will switch to Alatar as soon as she sets foot on Middle-earth, assuming that she would travel in male disguise.

Not that we’ll see her (or any of the others for that matter) too often in this tale. This is Aiwendil’s tale, the tale of his fostering of Lindir and his friendship with Wood-Elves and the forefathers of the Beornings, and it will end exactly where “Innocence” begins: with the arrival of Lindir in Imladris.

It is going to be a long tale, and the updates will probably be slow and far between. I still hope that some will find joy in reading it.

Soledad

Note: "Innocence is not posted to this site, as the rules wouldn't allow it. You can find it on FF.Net or in the Tolkien Fanfiction Archive.