HE. WAS. SUPPOSED. TO. WALK. BUCK. DOWN. THE. AISLE. AT. THE. BUDDIE. WEDDING.

Donald Sutherland 1935 - 2024

Rest in Peace, Donnie <3 He was a wonderful actor and (despite his brilliant portrayal of President Snow) a vocal anti-war activist throughout his life. Something we should all strive to emulate.

3rd of October: Durin's Day / An Treasamh Latha dhen Dàmhair: Là Dhurin

English Translation:

In the early years after the dragon came, the Dwarves of Erebor set their eyes on survival. Much was lost to them during this time, cultural and religious customs they failed to sustain in their wanderings.

As soon as they had homes once again, mines to work in and forges to fire, Thorin looked to these things for the final missing piece in their lives. His nephews, growing fast, had never experienced Durin's Day in any way other than that of the Blue Mountains.

He heard Erebor in their speech, saw it in the style of their clothes, and even in the weapons they favoured, but so much of his nephews' cultural references lay elsewhere. He wished for them to understand Durin's Day through the eyes of their own culture.

Thus, ten years since Erebor had seen its last Durin's Day, her people put on a feast in Thorin's Halls the like of which was rarely seen. They worked tirelessly to have everything right: musicians woke up old ballads, bakers brought back old delicacies, and the elders gathered to pass their folktales onto the new generations. The exiles.

Another wound was healed that night, another wrong put right. Thorin watched over the festivities as Fili and Kili learnt how to sing a traditional Erebor hymn and thought of his own childhood.

Finally, everyone came together on the stone slopes before the gates of their halls to watch the last vestiges of the sunset fade from the sky behind them and the autumn moon rise in the eastern horizon. For a precious few minutes, both lights lingered together, before the sun was overcome at last.

Thorin stood with his arm around Dis and the boys by their legs, wide-eyed with their first Durin's Day beads braided carefully in their hair. They were't likely to sleep tonight.

The towering stature of the Misty Mountains blocked it from view, but Thorin knew - could see - beyond their white peaks lay Erebor, bathed in the silver light of Durin's moon.

Maybe he started it, or perhaps they all did so at the same time, but slowly and quietly, their low Dwarven voices rose into the sky with a song of home-sickness on their lips. A mourning song.

Oh, far over the Misty Mountains cold...

Scottish Gaelic Translation:

Anns na bliadhnaichean a chaidh seachad as dèidh don nathair-sgiathach tighinn, thoirt na Troichean Erebor an sùilean air mairsinneach. Chaill iad tòrr tron àm seo, nòsan cultarach is creideamh nach do chùm iad beò anns am fuadan aca.

Cho luath ‘s a bha dachaighean aca a-rithist, mèinnean a bhith ag obair anns agus ceàrdaichean a chuir teinne anns, chaidh Thòrin don rudan seo a’ sireach am pìos mu dheireadh air fhàgail bho am beathannan sa Bheinn Ònaranach. A’ fàs cho àrd a-nist, cha robh na mic a pheathar eòlach idir air an dòigh dhen Là Dhurin ach an dòigh na Beanntan Ghorm.

Chuala e Erebor san dòigh-bhruidhinn aca, san stoidhle aodach, eadhon san arm a bha an dithis measail air. Ach leis na rudan beaga, chunnaic e gun robh sin a’ tighinn bho àitichean eile. Bha e airson ‘s gum biodh iad a’ tuigsinn Là Dhurin tron shùilean an cultar aca fhèin.

Air an adhbhar sin, deich bliadhna seach gun do chunnaic Erebor an Là Dhurin mu dheireadh, chuir an t-sluaigh aice seòin air dòigh nach fhaca iad gu tric anns na Tallachan Thòrin. Dh’obraich iad gu cruaidh airson a h-uile rud a bhith ceart: dh’èirich ceòladairean seann balantan, rinn bèicearan seann biadh fìnealta, agus chruinneach na daoine aosmhor ri chèile airson am beul-aithris aca a thoirt don ghinealaichean ùra. Na fògraich.

Shlànaich gort eile an oidhche sin, rud eile a chuir ceart. Choimhead Thòrin air an subhachas mar a dh’ionnsaich Fìli is Kìli laoidh traidiseanta Erebor a sheinn agus smaointeach e air na làithean anns an robh e fhèin beag.

Mu dheireadh thall, thàinig a h-uile duine ri chèile a-mach air na slèibhtean mu bheul an geata nan tallachan. Choimhead iad air dol fodha na grèine san speur air an cùlaibh, an solas a’ dol às beag air bheag. Agus gealach an foghair a’ tighinn suas san fàire Ear. Airson beagan mionaidean prìseil, dh’fhuirich an dà sholas anns an speur ri chèile mus do dh’fhalbh a’ ghrian.

Sheas Thòrin le a gàirdean timcheall a phiuthar, Dìs, agus na bhalaich ri taobh nan casan. Bha na sùilean drileach aca a’ coimhead mòr, agus bha a’ chiad grìogagan Là Dhurin a bh’ aca air pleatach anns am falt. Cha bhiodh e comasach gun cadail iad a-nochd.

Cha b’ urrainn dha a’ faicinn tro na Beanntan Àird a’ Cheò, ach bha fios aige gun robh Erebor air a seasamh dìreach thar air na mullaichean gheala, lannrach anns an t-solas ghealach Dhurin.

Is docha gun do thoiseach esan e, no ‘s docha gun do rinn iad uile e aig an aon am, ach gu slaodach agus gu samhach, chaidh na guthan ìosal troiche dhan speur le òran chianalais air an bilean.

Ò thar na Beanntan Àird fhuar a’ Cheò...

To help spread the blessing

I cast spell of all writers will make amazing progress next year *throws glitter on you*

LIKE TO CHARGE REBLOG TO CAST LET'S GET THIS FUCKER EXPLODEDED

Let me get this straight Barnaby. This is a man who was being blackmailed for taking advantage of one of the troubled girls he took in. He admits that he paid the blackmailer. He admits that he was worried about what people would think. He admits that he was going to go meet the blackmailer and accuser.

But he is innocent and she made it up because she's a bad seed (even when she says "don't tell me what John Waverley deserves").

Say, if it was true why would she have told you given you threw her into jail for 84 hours all up, told her John Waverley deserved better and told her he was a good man and you don't ever want to see her again?

We're supposed to ignore all of that and believe he is innocent and take in the moral of the story about how false accusations ruin people's lives on the grounds of *check's notes* John Barnaby likes and respects him. Cool cool cool cool.

all of tumblr tomorrow, march 15th:

x

i make myself laugh

lucy talks to rabadash before aslan judges him.

she never knew him well—she's never been very interested in any of her sister's suitors, not unless she's certain she'll need to step in, and he seemed reasonable enough, if smug and rather small in personality when he visited cair paravel. she didn't understand why susan wanted to go to calormen, but she'd never stop her sister from something that might make her happy, and edmund was going with her, so it's not like anything could go wrong. and anyway, someone needed to stay at cair paravel while peter went to the north. lucy would rather have gone with peter, but she'd also rather susan not be alone in the south. susan's alone all too often while the rest of them venture out across narnia. it's only fair she gets to spread her own wings a little.

they never thought anything could go wrong, no matter what the reputation of the tisroc. but then suddenly the splendour hyaline is spotted at the mouth of the harbor, and the raven is bringing her news both joyous and grievous in turn of her siblings' northern flight, and now there's a stag come to tell her that rabadash and a company two hundred strong have come to lay siege to anvard. lucy has an idea what he's crawled out of calormen for, and it's nothing to do with archenland. judging by the sick look on her sister's pale face, susan can guess well enough herself.

it's that look that has lucy mounting up beside edmund and riding out to anvard at double time. there is very little she wouldn't do for her family, and the lion help anyone who is the cause of her sister's distress. in the end, it's probably better it was edmund who fought rabadash in battle, because lucy's not so sure she'd have spared him.

the morning before he is to be judged, she escorts herself to the chambers where he is confined, a knife in each hand, and locks the door behind her. he is unbound, but the look in her eye keeps him seated in the chair where she finds him.

"i should like you to know," she tells him, not bothering with proper greetings—he does not deserve them, after all—as she leans against the arm of the chair opposite his, "that your cowardly plan would never have succeeded, even without the warning."

rabadash sneers at her, and not for the first time, lucy wonders how he ever conducted himself to be anything more than the ass that he is.

"narnia's high king is a fool and a craven," he scoffs. "he never would have attacked the great land of calormen and my father, the tisroc, may he live forever, over something so trifling as a mere sister."

this is not his first mistake, but he is lucky that it isn't his last. lucy's face goes very still and very stern, and rabadash glimpses for one terrifying moment why the narnians all call her valiant. why she is named for the sea, the harsh and changeable mistress, and the flowers that grow back first after wildfires.

"i wasn't actually talking about peter," she says, her voice chillingly light, all pretense and formality dropped, "though if you think he wouldn't have marched on tashbaan to save our sister, you're a much bigger fool than i thought."

her tone makes it perfectly clear just how much of him she thought, and it certainly wasn't very highly at all.

she strides forward to stand before him, which would be a very foolish thing to do in a company of an unbound and dangerous prisoner if that prisoner were braver than rabadash and lucy were anyone else, and leans down to meet his eye. she's not very tall, queen lucy, and yet to him she seems like a giant—terrible and beautiful in an entirely different way than her sister. she's so close he can see a long white scar on her neck, can smell horse and leather and chainmail and clean sweat, can see how her hair is bound back for convenience and not beauty, and her hands are rough and capable.

he is aware, suddenly, that he is afraid. that perhaps he has been since she entered the room.

"know this, son of tashbaan," says queen lucy the valiant, and the smile on her lips does not at all match her eyes. "if you had laid even the tip of one finger on my sister, the queen, i would have skinned you alive."

she leans back just enough for him to breathe, and he gasps with it.

"and do you know what?" she asks cheerfully.

he doesn't want to know. she tells him anyway.

"i really don't think peter would have stopped me."