So, I was thinking of this headcanony thought about Thrór: that he is far too impatient to do his braids properly which drives his wife Hrera absolutely insane when they first meet, and she takes to doing the braids for him. And then, because clearly there is not enough angst in the fandom, I…
I AM CRYING THIS IS HEARTBREAKING. Also, it is amazing. Reni, it is amazing. Amazing.
I am utterly devastated – and thank you, thank you so much. THANK YOU. Oh my god. READ THIS!!
Erebor, TA 2644
The presentation ofSimbaTorborThrain, son of Thror.
Based off of this and this.I’ve been meaning to do fanart for Sansukh for almost a year, so this was lots of fun.
I almost forgot to give Hrera a beard and had to add one at the last minute, otherwise I probably would have been served a lawsuit by the Ereborian royal family.
BRILLIANT!!!
(LOLOLOL@ ‘simba’ the cirrrrrrcle of liiiiiiiife)
Loving Hrera’s expression! AND HOT DAMN THROR’S BEARD YESSS
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
My new story on AO3, a gift for determamfidd renioferebor and justatouchofgoldsickness (or Thror and Thrain in the Sansukh podfic respectively) Thrór, son of Dáin, King under the Mountain, the mightiest of the Dwarves of Durin’s line, has just risen from his throne to greet the Elvenking, tripped over his robes and sent himself sprawling face first across the hard marble floor at the base of the throne.
AWWW BATTLEPIG, IT’S LOVELY
hahahahahaha, no dignity for you, Thror (THRAIN PFFT). Thank you so much! *tacklehugs and #babybattlepigs*)
*heart eyes* OKAY YOU INSPIRED ME AND I WROTE A DRABBLE. Hope you enjoy!
…
The first week was a blur.
Hrera did not have an easy birth, and the first week was spent mostly watching her snap at healers (who only wished to check the stitching) and gingerly hobbling about. Cloths were wadded in her smallclothes and she carried her cushion like it was a shield. She actually swore, vociferously and at length, when in the watercloset the day after the birth. Thror, who was holding his son at the time (oh his son! His beautiful son, his heir!) looked up in alarm. “Dear?”
“Mind your own business,” Hrera grunted. slightly muffled by the door.
Thror decided not to inquire further. Diplomacy was the watchword of Kings, after all.
He returned his attention to the little one – not that he needed any prompting. His eyes drifted to the boy every three seconds or so. He could barely take his eyes from him. The baby was well-formed, the healers had said, and strong and hale. He had barely any hair on his little head, but a smattering on his cheeks and chin already. His face was slack in sleep, with the slightly-squashed, unfinished look of all newborns.
They hadn’t yet decided on a name. Hrera was all for a traditional Broadbeam name such as Thebur or Harur, but Thror was a bit on-the-fence about it. He preferred a family name: Fror, perhaps, or maybe Thrain. After all, this child was heir to a Longbeard crown.
Three days later (and after a couple of rousing… discussions) they had decided on “Torbor”. Longbeard enough to satisfy the more hidebound amongst his nobles, but Broadbeam enough for Hrera’s sensibilities.
She took to motherhood like a duck to the air – with some initial flapping, and a squawk or two. Feeding Torbor was not easy at first, as the baby had a tied tongue and could not suckle properly, and he damaged his mother in his efforts to nurse. Hrera underwent several days of utter agony. Eventually she nearly burst into tears at the sound of the thin, hungry wails soaring through their rooms. “Oh, no,” she whimpered, her eyes filling even though her face never crumpled. “No, not again!”
“Are you certain you will not give him to a wetnurse?” Thror asked anxiously. “My dear, I would not see you hurt yourself…”
“No. NO. I am his mother: I will feed him.” Hrera pulled herself up sharply in their bed and rubbed her eyes. Then she set her face in a look of such determination that Thror honestly would not have faced her upon any battlefield. “Give him here. If I have to be awake at this unearthly hour, I am at least not going to be the one traipsing over cold stone floors!”
Thror scurried to get the baby, and made a mental note to have carpets installed.
The Healers made a quick adjustment to the baby’s mouth the next day: a little snip, and the tongue-tie was gone. Upon bringing Torbor back to the breast, Hrera’s eyes widened. “Oh,” she said wonderingly. “It.. doesn’t hurt.”
“That’s as it should be,” said the Healer.
Thror smiled, and kissed the side of her head. “You are a wonder.”
She looked up at him from their child, a rare soft look on her face. “Yes,” she said with such gentleness, “yes, he is.”
Then the day came to present the baby to the court and the people. Hrera looked strange to Thror with her hair and beard once again elaborately braided and beaded. She had worn it plain and unbound for some time as she healed and adjusted to her new role as Torbor’s mother. Now, with her hair glittering with pearls and diamonds, her ears threaded with rubies, and her gown elaborately studded with tiny garnets no bigger than the tip of Torbor’s finger, she seemed as unchanged as the very stone itself. The past wonderful, painful, dizzying and secluded week seemed nearly a dream as they moved along the great high walkways – well, if not for the precious little bundle that dozed in Hrera’s arms.
Then Hrera glanced at Thror through the corner of her eyes as they approached the thrones at a stately walk (the better to disguise her diminished-but-still-present hobble), and gave him a slow but solemn wink.
He had to fight to conceal his grin.
Finally, they arrived before the thrones and turned to view their people, clustered around the great chamber in their thousands. Hrera handed Thror the baby, and he held the tiny boy up before the assembled, wrapped in dark blue cloth embroidered with their dual lineage. “I present to you,” Thror said, in his most carrying voice, “our child! I declare them fit and healthy before the eyes of Dwarves and Mahal. I give you Tor-”
“Thrain,” Hrera said suddenly.
Thror paused in mid-declaim, thrown off his stride. He gave his wife a wide-eyed look. “Dear? Are…”
“Yes, I’m certain,” she said, and gave him a warm, private little smile. “Go on, tell them.”
He had to smile helplessly back at her. “I’m reasonably sure you just told them for me,” he said, as dryly as he could under the circumstances.
She laughed, low and fond, even as the cheering rose from the crowd and rang until it shook the very roots of the Mountain.
Oooooh, good question, Nonnie.
When I think up a character, I don’t really consider their facial features in much depth, to be honest. I concentrate far more on other attributes, such as relationships, behaviour, personality, likes and dislikes. Sometimes a prominent physical characteristic gets in there if it is relevant to who the character is (Barur’s giant moustache, Loni’s height, Jeri’s green beard) but mostly, I paint them in very broad strokes.
That said, there are a couple of actors who I consider very close to the characters! Perhaps only the hair or eye colour differs. No beards, unfortunately. They could all play the roles (in some cases, under a LOT of Dwarven padding and gear. Dwarven body ratios *headdesk*)
Orla – Grace Jones
(Orla is faaaaar bustier. But good goddamn.)
Hrera – Helen Mirren OR Sian Phillips
(waaaaaay too skinny, but the faces and the gravitas is JUST RIGHT. Hrera has hazel eyes, and light brown hair.)
Christina Hendricks – Gimris
Dawn French – Genna
(though Genna has ginger hair!)
Rose Leslie – Bomfris
(”you know nothing, Thorin Stonehelm”)
Rita Hayworth – Fris
Baris – Rebel Wilson
(Baris, however, has brown hair)
I’d love to hear other people’s ideas! Fan casting is fun 🙂
Awwwwww ❤ That’s adorable.
BRIBE ALL THE GREAT-GRANDKIDS YUS.
ABSOLUTELY.
Haban will just watch with unimpressed expression and raised eyebrows. Hrera will cut everybody off at the knees with the power of her disapproval.
Tillis and Var are utterly in love with them. They’d forgive them anything. Ever. They laugh at their pranks, sigh fondly at their mischief. Tillis fusses over Fili and tries to lessen his self-appointed guardianship and responsibilities, and Var jokes and tussles about with Kili.
Hrera huffs quite a bit. She pretends utter horror over Kili’s hair, but actually adores getting her paws on him and combing it. It’s such fine hair, why does he never take decent care of it? He’s nearly as bad as that Gimli. Such disarray. Tch.
She is hugely proud of both of them, but will not take any of their ‘nonsense’ as she calls it. She is not above resorting to bribes to get them to behave around her (Broadbeam Dumpling Soup, oh yes!). Now and then she wonders how stern, steely-eyed Dis ever produced such ruffians – and then she glances at merry-faced, laughing Vili, and wonders no more.
Thror is a constant but unobtrusive presence for both the boys. They were very apprehensive at first: Thror is a mighty figure, and everything he did, both the good and the bad, changed the face of the world forever. But this quiet, self-deprecating Dwarrow with the sad eyes isn’t quite what they were expecting. Thror provides a quiet haven for them. He loves them dearly, and wishes he could have seen them grow up, grow old.
Frerin – well <3. Frerin at first resents the heck out of them. He waited so long for his brother, so so long. And these two Dwarrows (and Thorin turns to them before he turns to Frerin, that is unfair) are who Thorin thinks of before anyone else. They are taller than him, and older than him, and will not call him uncle. He doesn’t know where he fits in. He doesn’t know his role for a long time. This time is investigated in more depth in Twelve Months and Fifty Years.
Eventually, as we see, Frerin connects with his brother again. He finds his place in Thorin’s life (death?) again. And he discovers that he and Fili have a lot more in common than their similar looks. Fili becomes a mentor and a sounding-board for Frerin, and Frerin becomes Fili’s ‘little uncle’. Frerin will eventually find a connection with Kili as well.
Fris is carefully mothering of the lads. When she looks at them, she sees her little girl, her Dis, her sweet sparrow. She sees Dis in the set of Fili’s chin, in the flash of Kili’s dark eyes. She is careful not to usurp that place, however. She (Fris is an instrument-maker) brings her lap-harp or her gittern along when they drag out their fiddles, and they play together. She makes sure that Fili eats, and that Kili does not sulk (Fris is good at stopping people from sulking – plenty of practice!).
Thrain, on his good days, is an amused observer of the boys. He comments now and then, but doesn’t really step in to chastise them or curtail their antics. He leaves that to Thorin or Hrera. He finds them hilarious. He’s warm and totally nonjudgmental, and so the boys both find it very easy to confide in him – to complain, or to speak about difficult things. Thrain is a good listener, and will always put down his tools and get out a jug of ale to sit with them as they whine or exclaim or groan.
Hrera was rather cool. She isn’t a Dragonish or shrewish MIL, but she is rather intimidating.
Over time, however, she began to realise: Fris is clever. VERY clever. And sensible, and compassionate. Fris is, in fact, the perfect counterbalance to her sometimes-impulsive, brave, passionate son. She began to approve heartily of Fris, and even to love her (though for years Fris had no idea, and wondered sometimes if Hrera liked her at all).
Fris didn’t understand why her family goggled at her when Hrera gave her a set of silver clasps for her nameday, made by the Queen’s own hand… and then proceeded to braid them into Fris’ fine, wheat-blond hair. That’s Hrera’s preferred show of soft affection, after all. At the time, Fris had no idea, and sat quietly and slightly nervous as Hrera bound her hair and beard with silver and sapphires.
Hrera adores her grandchildren. ADORES THEM. She was a very doting grandmother. She was absolutely astonished that Fris was able to have three kids within so few years – three children would be quite a large family by Dwarven standards Bombur is an outlier and should not have been counted 😉. And with each little baby she fell deeper in love with being a grandmother. Thorin and Dis were both very like the Durin side of the family – they held grudges, they were headstrong and stubborn, with dark looks and reserved expressions that concealed an absolute whirlwind of passionate emotion. But Frerin was more like Fris in spirit – and more like the warm, generous, demonstrative Broadbeams she remembered from her youth.
I love Thror. *wibbles*
He’s not had a very happy life, poor thing. Father and brother killed by a dragon in the Grey Mountains, then his wife and his daughter-in-law by Smaug in the Erebor he worked to rebuild, and then Azanulbizar… just. What a life. He created glory, just as his dark-name predicted – but ruin followed, and he blames himself (wrong or right, he blames himself for everything. He was the King of Durin’s Folk – their travails are his responsibility. OH THESE DURIN MEN, says Hrera).
I consider him to be wry and self-deprecating and rather quiet in manner when he doesn’t have his King-face on. He is fond and proud of Hrera’s way of bossing-to-show-love. I think he shows his affection in small, gentle, quiet ways: a cup of tea placed by an elbow, sharing a silent tankard in solidarity, reaching out to clasp a hand and squeezing briefly, warm and dry and full of meaning. I think he would have a very dark sense of humour. He would be a superb deadpan snarker.
I think Thror will be helped by seeing his grandson’s journey. He’s not all unhappiness, not at all, but he’s still not in a good place. He’ll find his way.
Still, in the meantime, Hrera will chivvy and boss him in her most imperious manner until he smiles in amusement and pride at her, private and loving, and say gently, “yes, my dear.”
Aw Yiss 