The Middle Distance

Halloween Self-Rec!

Please indulge me, I don’t do this very often. But I’m still very proud of this creepy little tale I wrote three years ago. It doesn’t get much traffic since it’s gen and OC-centric, but I do love literary pastiche, I love the Shire and the creepy feel of the early LOTR chapters, and I had so much fun writing a J.R.R. Tolkien/Washington Irving mashup.

The Terror of Rushy Hollow at AO3.

Happy Halloween and Blessed Samhain!

Originally posted to AO3 6/28/2017

Title: When Wind is In the Deadly East
Fandoms: Lord of the Rings + Sherlock fusion
Characters: Sherlock Holmes, Eurus Holmes, Mycroft Holmes. As giant eagles.
Rating: T for some violence and incestuous ideation
Word count: 6754
Tags: All-Eagle AU, Holmes Siblings in Middle-earth and they are all Giant Eagles, overtones of incest, Undertones of Incest, The Final Problem Except They're All Giant Eagles, Fandom Fusion, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Holmes Family

Summary: “Brother mine, the dark clouds gathering have long stalked you, from the days of our home eyrie, and at last I shall tell you the full tale of our lost sister.”

“It was news to me that we had one. It would have gone less ill for us had I learned of this sooner.”

“You remember nothing, then. I thought as much. I shall tell you the full tale of Eurys our sister, burned through and corrupted by the East Wind where long she soared in circles, with the flames of madness in her eyes and the soot of Mordor in her feathers. The lost nestmate long imprisoned since our first eyrie burned. You were barely more than hatchlings, you and she, when first she tried to slay you. ”

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The third and final Eagle-centric Tolkien story for my Fandom Trumps Hate bidder lydiabennet (Teasel). I so enjoyed our email exchange with your ideas - you inspired me to write a story that never would have existed otherwise.

Massive thanks to my betas Tyellas and iwantthatcoat!

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I am WAY behind on replying to comments on this one. Like, I haven't done it at all and it's been haunting me. I have to go back into the mindset of writing this weird thing, I think. It's had the fewest readers of anything I've written in years (for reasons I think are pretty obvious) but the people who read it REALLY loved it. I'm a little overwhelmed.

Written for the Porn Battle Amnesty challenge on Dreamwidth.

Fandom: Lord of the Rings
Pairing: Aragorn/Watcher in the Water
Rating: NC-17/E
Warnings/Content notes: Rape/non-con, tentacles, nonconsentacles, tentacle porn with no redeeming social value.

Summary: During the all-too-brief years of Balin's reclamation of Khazad-dûm, the Ranger Aragorn of the Dúnedain embarks on a mission to gather information and warn the Dwarves of peril. The Doors of Durin are still shut, and the peril that lurks nearby is one no one had imagined.

Prompt: Aragorn/Watcher in the Water, tentacles, lust, pheromones, wet, indignity, body, shame, undressed, slime, dark, mud

A Ranger, Caught Off His Guard at AO3

I don't think I've ever written straight-up tentacle porn before, believe it or not!

Title: The Terror of Rushy Hollow
Fandom: The Lord of the Rings
author: vulgarweed
Rating: PG
Pairing: None really - Hobbit OC-centric
Summary:One dark autumn night in the Shire, a rejected suitor leaves a harvest festival with a heavy heart - and a head swimming with eerie stories. Particularly of a new terror never seen in the Shire before: the ghastly spectre the locals call the Faceless Horseman.

Those familiar with The Red Book of Westmarch will recognise this as a rustic, romanticised, and garbled hobbit-centric account of certain alarming events that occurred in the Shire in the autumn of TA 3018, on the eve of the War of the Ring.

Those familiar with more recent literature will note that this story bears such a strong resemblance to the plot of Washington Irving's story "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," one realises Mr Irving must have had some passing acquaintance with Middle-earth folklore.

The Terror of Rushy Hollow at AO3


Happy Halloween, Shirelings!

I wrote:

The Corsair of Carcosa
For: hoshi_ryo
From: vulgarweed
Rating: PG
Characters: Crowley, Aziraphale, Hastur, The Them, Randolph Carter, Dream, Cassilda the Cat
Fandoms: Good Omens/The King in Yellow/The Cthulhu Mythos/Sandman

Summary: Forbidden literature is forbidden because stories can change the world. For good and for ill.
Prompt: “Aziraphale gets his hands on a rare copy of the play The King in Yellow. Reading and its consequences ensue.”

Author's Notes: “The King in Yellow” doesn't really exist – it's a sinister play that's alluded to and plays a role in the events of four Robert W. Chambers short stories: The Repairer of Reputations, The Yellow Sign, The Mask, and In the Court of the Dragon. H.P. Lovecraft was an admirer of Chambers who alluded to these stories in his own, and the KIY cycle has been adopted pretty thoroughly into the Cthulhu Mythos (by August Derleth more than HPL himself). So I incorporated a lot of elements from Lovecraft stories, particularly “The Cats of Ulthar” and “The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath,” to the point where it wound up being pretty much a crossover. Sandman, also – all things that take place in the Dreaming come under the rule of Morpheus. (There are also allusions to a couple other Neil Gaiman works, and shoutouts to several other writers as well.) I hope it all holds up as a story despite this patchwork.

AO3 link
GO Exchange link


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I also want to rave and gush about the story that was written for me!

We Must Bear Witness, by hsavinien

I've wanted a Lord of the Rings/Good Omens crossover for years, and they are not easy to come by. Thought of writing one myself, but haven't gotten around to it yet. (Crowley and Aziraphale would be snarky Maiar, of course). And hsavinien wrote this one, and took it in such a fantastic direction. I had asked for a story where Aziraphale and Crowley find themselves on different sides of an historical conflict (real or fictional history), and here they are, as Istari among the Gondorians and the Haradrim, respectively, during the Battle of the Pelennor Fields. I love everything about this. I love the fact that they're genderswapped/woman-shaped. I love the insight into both cultures. I love their relationship, and the way it unfolds. I love the depth of the Tolkien lore in play here. I love everything. Read it and give it love!