I Resist the Muses

15: Mistaken Identity

14: What do you dream?

I found it interesting that my brother opened his answer to this question with a dictionary definition of superstition, being the belief that a certain action will cause a certain event without an actual direct cause and effect link.

But then again, this word was invented, and its definition was written, by people of a culture whose belief in magic is nil, and whose belief in religion is minimal. So perhaps it is not surprising that such things are dismissed as being superstitions.

But, look at it from another angle. What if magic is real? What if the Gods are real? Who is to say "there is no direct causal link" between a certain action and a certain result. The Valar can ALWAYS be the link, they may intervene at any time, and if they suddenly decide that the number 13 is unlucky, and anyone who answers a prompt in a certain community bearing the number 13 will have eternal bad luck, then so be it.

Yesterday my brother and I received an email (now if anything is evidence of a missing link between cause and effect then anything to do with computers is certain to be just that), which threatened that if we did not pass on the email to ten friends then we would die, just as some poor woman did who failed to do the same. Maitimo merely laughed and pressed the "delete" button, and reminded me that the threat of death only works on mortals.

My point though, is that magic, and superstition, and anything of that nature, is really nothing more than a science which is not yet understood. A computer in Valinor would have been called Magic. A gun would have been called the work of Morgoth. Here, in the Seventh age of Arda, they are merely scientific tools of one sort or another, and no-one regards either of them as magic.

Character: Maglor
Fandom: Silmarillion

I am Canafinwë Macalaurë (pronounced Mac-a-LAU-ray), though I was better known as Maglor, the second of Feanor's seven sons who followed him in exile to Beleriand in pursuit of the Silmarils.

People say, sometimes, that they find it hard to believe that Maitimo and I are brothers, we are so different. I was always the quiet one, the fey one, frail and delicate, or so it seemed. I was born just a few years after Maitimo, not long as far as elven lives go, and though we were far apart in personality, we were close in every other way. But appearances can also be deceptive.

It's odd, really, when I look back on my life, the time he was alive all through the First Age, I do not remember a time when he was not there. Even when we dwelt for a while in seperate fortresses, there was barely a month without some contact between us, a message or a visit. After the Nirnaeth Arnoediad, we were never apart, until that terrible day when our Oath was done, and Maitimo fell to his death as Beleriand crumbled and sank in flame around us.

You know elves are immortal. Those who die, as Maitimo did, are eventually reborn and they get a chance to live all over again. Perhaps it is a way to atone for the wrongs done in a previous life; to start again and get it all right this time. But there is no ageing or disease for us; those who do not die from violence or war or suicide, those elves are doomed to live for ever. You do not know how long "for ever" actually is, until you've lived that long. I walked the shores of Middle Earth throughout all the Ages from the Second to this one; a quiet wisp on the wind, never seen but always seeing. Seldom heard, but hearing all. Answering to many names but my own.

I saw my foster-son raise the glory of Numenor, and watched as it fell. I watched the War of the Ring from my secret hiding place in Rivendell. I have sung laments for every one of Middle Earth's sorrows. I did not follow the elves' return to the Undying Lands; instead I remained alone. Waiting, waiting, for my brother Maitimo to be reborn, and find him once again.

Character: Maglor
Fandom: Tolkien/Silmarillion