Title: Amhdlug
Fandom: Tolkien - both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings
Rating: Teen
Length: 685 words
Content Notes: Mentions of misgendering, references to previous violence
Author Notes: Agnu Ra Nutû is an AU where Thorin and Denethor are both female-bodied, and a variety of other changes also occur. This is set after all the currently complete ones, and while it should stand on its own, it does assume a basic familiarity with the AU. There are further notes under the first cut to summarize most of what's happened so far (and while future stories will not change major events, extra details get added in no particular order).

Title means exile, and while the only word in the Dwarrow Scholar's dictionary for exile is a verb, this is my best guess for what the noun would be, based on the rules to form verbs. Khazâd means dwarves.

Summary: Denethor has left the only kin he has remaining.

Important Plot Points from Agnu Ra Nutû: Thorin, Fíli, and Kíli survive the Battle of Five Armies; Ori, Glóin, Legolas, and Thorin Stonehelm (Dáin's son) do not. Kíli/Tauriel is a thing. Gimli doesn't come to Erebor until sixty years after it's reclaimed. Kíli and Tauriel become part of the Fellowship. Denethor/Finduilas, with two discrete thirds at particular points of the marriage. Boromir dies not at Amon Hen but in Mount Doom. Denethor does not go mad and try to self-immolate.

The view before him is vast and wild, and Denethor glances away to search for a spot of ground bare enough to place camp. He hasn't come to the furthest reaches of the world just for the view, after all - and it galls that he has to come this far to avoid the accusations and hostility that had greeted him when he'd finally emerged from his rooms, healed enough to once more take on the role of Ruling Steward. A throne - not as grand as a king's, but he'd never wanted so great a throne - that he has passed to Faramir, though there had been arguments that Faramir was no more suited than he (she, they said, with voices that dripped disdain at best).

Denethor smiles to himself, even if it is a little bitter. Faramir had been his heir since Finduilas died, and he had made quiet changes to the law to ensure that regardless of any discovery, Faramir would become Steward after him. His son, even though he'd had not sired him nor borne him. His son, who'd claimed him as father even after knowing the secret.

Faramir, who'd listened to the bile, to the accusations and the doubts, and quietly told the lords of Gondor just what would happen. Told them they would leave Denethor to go where he would, as he would - he, no matter what body lay under the robes of a Steward - and not be shamed for who he is, or what he has done.

His younger, beloved son who'd told a returning Aragorn that his services were appreciated, that he was welcome as Gondor's Captain-General, as her shield and her sword, but that he had no legal claim to the throne of the king, as the laws pertaining to the succession of a King were still as they had always been, passed through the male line alone. The rule of Arnor he could not deny was Aragorn's by right, and he would offer his aid in such, but he would not surrender the rod of office, nor the winged crown in its vault.

That memory draws a smile to Denethor's face again as he shakes his head, looking for the companions who'd offered to escort him to Dale - another few who did not use she when they spoke of him.

"Tauriel thought there was a spot a few miles on that would do for tonight." Kíli is leaning against a rock that Denethor thinks would be an excellent place to sit and contemplate the great wild before him, if he were inclined to do so. Waiting for Denethor to have looked his fill over the broad and sere beauty of the northern wilds beyond the Woodland Realm. "Aragorn went with her. Thought you were too awed by the land to move on quite yet."

Kíli's expression suggests he thinks otherwise, and Denethor tilts his head in acknowledgement of that.

"I would not have thought to ever see it, were it not for a Haradrim blade." Denethor can think of that now without wincing, though sometimes he still curses that dead man in the dark watches of the night when he can't sleep.

"And your son." Kíli speaks the words Denethor could not, though they're not an accusation as he always hears in his head, not sneered through disdainful disbelief, but a quiet affirmation of what he had proclaimed at Faramir's birth, and what Faramir had acknowledged anew after the battle that had revealed to Gondor the lie Denethor has lived all his life.

After a moment, Kíli smiles brightly, pushing away from the rock. "My uncle will be glad to meet you, I think. He'd never even thought about Men being like khazâd in that fashion until I mentioned your letters."

That, perhaps more than anything, is a comfort in his exile. To be among those who at least will not call him a woman, and will not even see him as anything but a man so long as he calls himself such.