Eöl
The Dark Elf, Husband of Aredhel, Father of Maeglin
Returning the project of creating Sims for most of the major characters in The Silmarillion, the most logical was (to me) completing Turgon's branch of the family. Since I'd already made a Sim for his sister Aredhel, it only followed that her husband and son should be next. Although I have to admit, I've always thought of Eöl as Aredhel's "mate" rather than "husband" since at best, Tolkien called her relationship with him "not wholly unwilling." Luring a woman into her house and then not letting her leave doesn't seem to me to be the most amiable of marriage arrangements. Curufin may not have been the best of the sons of Fëanor, but I felt he was right on the money when he told Eöl, "Do not flaunt the title of your wife before me. For those who steal the daughters of the Noldor and wed them without gift or leave do not gain kinship with their kin." One could certainly call Eöl an unpleasant sort, since he refused to live within the Girdle of Melian (despite being of Elwë's kin), and preferred darkness and was more friendly with Dwarves than he appeared to be with other Elves. Of course, Aredhel being rather headstrong and unwilling to listen the advice of anybody might well have deserved the fate that was to be hers.
At any rate, in creating a Sim for Eöl, I went looking for a description of him. He was tall and grim, and supposedly bent by his labors at the forge (though bent by labor is about as achieveable in the Sims as tall). There was no specific mention of his hair color, and of his habits of dress, it was said that when he went abroad, he wore stuff made of a black metal called galvorn that he had devised in his smithy. It was that habit and his dislike of sunlight that earned the name "Dark Elf," but I decided to go all the way, especially since I've tended to make Telerin Elves fair-haired and I've said elsewhere that I don't believe that any of the Elven kindreds were likely to have been entirely fair-haired or entirely dark-haired. I hadn't planned on giving him that small, cold smile, but I decided I liked it better than making him frown or scowl. With the heavy brows I gave him, it felt it comes off looking more disturbing than pleasant, though he must have been able to put on enough of a pleasant face to lure Aredhel to him. The braids weren't meant to look like dreadlocks, but to seem like a more Dwarven, distinctly un-Elven style, since Eöl seemed to like Aulë's folk better than his own.
