Darkest Night Exchange 2019

[narya_flame]

Dear Writer,

Hi! It's the height of summer here but I'm already excited for autumn – cooler weather, comfort food, and of course a good dose of dark and scary fiction to pass the lengthening nights.

I love fic that deals with difficult themes, so I'm really looking forward to seeing what you'll write. The tag set was amazing and it was really tough to narrow down. I'd be equally thrilled with anything about any of the tags and characters I've selected so please don't read anything into the length of the prompts, or whether I've requested the characters before.

I haven't included tons of shippy/smutty prompts here because most of the tags I've picked out are focussed around horror, injuries and supernatural goings-on, but if you do want inspiration in that direction, my Smut Swap and Fandom Growth Exchange letters both have some character-agnostic likes and ideas.

All prompts and scenarios below are 100% optional and intended for inspiration only, so please go in a different direction if that's what your story wants to do. Also feel free to combine prompts, if it works – for example, Maglor finding Amroth by the sea shore.

These are all fic requests, but art, edits, fanmixes etc. as treats are more than welcome!
 

General Likes

- Complex character dynamics

- Conflicting motivations

- Found families/families of choice

- Canon divergence and “fix it” AUs

- Grief and tragedy

- Hope, redemption and reconciliation

- In-world myths and legends

- Unusual perspectives, minor characters, original characters and textual ghosts

- Unreliable narrators and quirky narrative structures – for example, epistolary, fragmented narratives, stories told through found documents, framing devices, stories told out of chronological order

- Twist endings/a sting in the tail

- In-world meta – scholarship, catalogues, bestiaries and spellbooks, marginalia, letters, working papers and project notes

- Worldbuilding details

- Objects and places with special significance – a “sense of history”

- Food, drink and celebration

- Battle scenes and/or aftermath

- Storytelling, riddles and poetry

- Candlelight

- Libraries, archives and other knowledge repositories

- Myth, folklore and fairy-tale

- The supernatural and uncanny – ghosts, magic, telepathy...

- Fusions of science and magic

 

Darkfic Likes

 

- Whump/hurt without comfort, including terminal illness or fatal injury

- Mental illness, including depression and suicidal thoughts

- Substance abuse

- Death and grief

- Torture

- Psychological manipulation and abuse

- Unhealthy relationships/relationships with troubling dynamics, including obsession, jealousy and co-dependency

- Possession

- Dark magic and curses

- Corruption and decay

- Sentient nature

- Resurrection and necromancy

- Being trapped in a small dark space, possibly with something terrifying lurking nearby

- Ghost and horror stories – I'm a huge fan of Edgar Allen Poe, M.R. James and Sheridan Le Fanu.

 

DNWs

 

Same as in my signup, but including here for reference.

 

- Character bashing (I'm A-OK with one character criticising another's actions, or characters arguing or disliking one another, but please no shoehorning of personal dislikes.)

- Crack fic

- Explicitly described rape

- Focus on scat, vomit or bodily fluids (blood from injuries is OK)

- Childbirth or pregnancy, except a passing mention

- A/B/O

- Heavy/lifestyle BDSM

 

(This should go without saying, but for the record, it's not that I don't think these things should exist. I do in fact enjoy fic about some of these things, but I'm choosy about the how and the wherefore, so it's easier for exchanges if I just opt out of them.)

 

Requests

 

Sellic Spell

 

Grinder; Grinder's Dam

 

Tags - Body Horror; Body Modification; Non-Consensual Body Modification; Corruption; Dark Magic; Ghosts; Ritual Gone Wrong; Sentient Malevolent Nature

 

I don't have any specific prompts for this, beyond what I've pulled out from the tag set, but I'm really interested in ideas of monstrousness and explorations of otherness, and I love the Beowulf story and Tolkien's strange, folk tale reworking of it. I'm hard to squick when it comes to violence, so be as graphic as you like.

 

The Lay of Aotrou and Itroun

 

The Corrigan; Aotrou/Itroun; Itroun/Corrigan; Children of Aotrou and Itroun & Corrigan

 

Tags - Blood Drinking; Blood Kink; Blood Magic; Cursed Dreams; Curses; Dark Fairy Tale Elements; Dark Magic; Ghosts; Magic Curses; Moral Ambiguity; Witch Hunters; Witchcraft

I read this poem for the first time this year, and I'm in love. (If you haven't read it I thoroughly recommend it; it doesn't take long to read through.) The Breton setting! The creepy Corrigan! Curses! Bargains! Magic! There's so much you could do with this, and I'd be thrilled to get something really dark here – non-con is more than OK, and I'd love to see blood magic explored through the lens of sex.

Alternatively, how about a bit of post-canon exploration? I can't help thinking that Aotrou and Itroun's twin children might one day go looking for revenge on the wicked fairy whose tricks and wiles caused their parents' deaths. Flipped POV is always fascinating, too. Perhaps the Corrigan isn't so wicked as all that. Maybe she has a story of her own to tell...

(NB this fandom is an exception to my pregnancy and rape DNWs.)

 

The Silmarillion

 

Maglor

 

Tags – Aftermath of Torture; Broken Bones; Character Is Hiding Aftereffects of Trauma; Concussions; Difficult Choices in time of war; Exile; Ghosts; Hurt/Comfort; Immortal Character with Mortal Loved Ones; Loneliness; Nightmares; Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder – PTSD; Ruined Castles and Fortresses; Scars; Touch-Starved; Architectural Horror.

 

I love the potential of Maglor's story to continue beyond the end of the First Age. I don't mind when you want to set the story, and if you'd like to move past canon and into known history, I'm completely OK with that – I love Maglor-in-history fics.

Some possible ideas...

• Wandering through a ruined city
• Encountering a Houseless Elf, maybe even someone he knew
• His time as a prince and commander in the First Age, having to make impossible decisions in the face of Morgoth's forces
• Captured by Sauron
• Events from our history seen through his eyes – the Black Death, the American War of Independence, the fall of the Berlin Wall...
• Forming an attachment to a mortal or group of mortals, knowing he will one day lose them

 

Celegorm

 

Tags – Becoming The Thing That You Most Hate/Fear; Betrayal; Broken Bones; Character Is Hiding Aftereffects of Trauma; Character only cares about themselves and one other; Descent into Madness; Enduring Pain to Protect Another; Ghosts; Hurt/Comfort; Moral Ambiguity; Recovery is painful and slow; Revenge; Scars

 

Celegorm's arc is so tragic – from beloved master of Huan to usurper, betrayer and murderer. It's up to you whether you want to explore his darkest hours or his earlier days in Middle-earth, or, for the recovery tag, maybe even his time in the Halls, or his eventual rebirth.

 

Eönwë

 

Tags - Invisible Shackles; Moral Ambiguity

 

This combination of tags with this character made my mind go in two directions at once – the obeisance of Sauron, and the raid of Maglor and Maedhros on Eönwë's camp. Or maybe Eönwë is the one in shackles, and his service to Manwë isn't entirely willing; I'm completely down with dark Valar, if that's a road you want to travel.

 

The Lord of the Rings

 

Amroth

 

Tags – Character Is Hiding Aftereffects of Trauma; Concussions; Exhaustion; Hurt/Comfort; Hypothermia; Memory Loss; Recovery is painful and slow; Scars; Broken Bones

 

I'd envisaged this as a version of events where Amroth lives, though probably with some serious injuries and trauma. Maybe he's found by a friendly group of Avari, or by Men? Entirely up to you whether you'd like to give him a happy ending and let him find his way back to Nimrodel.

 

Goldberry

 

Tags – Asphyxiation; Curses; Drowning; Ghosts; Magic Curses; Manipulation; Moral Ambiguity; Sentient Malevolent Nature

 

What and who is Goldberry?! Her and Tom definitely have a dark side, which I would love to see explored. How did they come to the forest, and what is the nature of their power over the land around them? What exactly does Tom mean when he calls her “River-daughter”?

 

Old Man Willow

 

Tags – Asphyxiation; Curses; Becoming The Thing That You Most Hate/Fear; Magic Curses; Memory Loss; Moral Ambiguity; Sentient Malevolent Nature

 

I find Old Man Willow fascinating and frightening, and can't help wondering about his origins. What kind of power does Tom Bombadil have over him? What made him decide to start luring and devouring stray wandering Hobbits? Or feel free to leave him unexplained, if you prefer; I'd be just as happy with a cautionary tale set in the Old Forest, or a vignette about his malevolent musings.

 

The Hobbit

 

Belladonna Took

 

Tags – Ghosts; Haunted Houses; Intrigue; Murder Mystery; Ruined Castles and Fortresses; Sentient Malevolent Nature

 

What kinds of trouble might the adventurous Ms Took have got herself into, to make Gandalf remember her so fondly? Maybe she sails out to Tol Himring and encounters a sorrowing spirit. Perhaps she ventures into the Old Forest. Or maybe there's trouble closer to home, in the Shire – an unexplained disappearance, an intruder lurking by the borders, or a mysterious dwelling where nothing ever stays where the owner puts it...

 

Crossover

 

Goldberry & Lalaith

 

Tags – Character A is a ghost that only Character B can see and touch; Curses; Drowning; Ghosts; Magic Curses; Memory Loss; Moral Ambiguity; Sentient Malevolent Nature

 

I'm in love with the idea of Goldberry encountering the ghost of little Lalaith. I don't mind whether you want to depict Goldberry as a comforting mother and friend figure, or whether her interactions with Lalaith's spirit take a darker turn. Does Tom get to meet Lalaith too? Or maybe Lalaith likes to hang out by the Withywindle, leading unwary travellers to the water with her laughter...