Never use those "undo" and "redo" buttons unless you really know how they work!
I had a longish post on the making and managed to delete part of it because the laptop had decided to paint a part of the text when I was pushing the delete-button for an extra letter... the result: everything gone.
I soo hate technology when it offers you no recall of what you have just done.
So let me try and be brief as it's getting considerably late in here.
Yes Galadriel. It might be an idea Wormtongue appointed that Scarburg Hall owner into an eorlship (it would be quite blasphemous but it might work for our story) - and that it had been kind of forgotten from the POV of Meduseld (no one probably knew or remembered it there). But was he a wrongly apppinted eorl or not, he would have taken a kind of role of an eorl there when all the decent eorlinga were fighting the war - and that would also explain why not all the farmers around look at the present Mead Hall positively as they have bad memories on how things were handled by that place earlier...
But another issue took me over then, and it was a question of the three warlords' ancestry. So had they lived at the Mid Emnet for all their lives or had they been moving there only after the war. And then I got this idea I think might serve us well with developing the plot.
So how about, after the war, Friduhelm aged about 35 then came back to the age-old home of his family - where little Faramund (then probably five or something) was happy to meet him back from the war. Now he would then be about fifty, so a little older than Athanar and Eodwine and their mate form the war - and Faramund would be like twenty.
Alboin would have come back to his home as well but with different feelings as he would have carried his father's corpse with him back home. So Alboin, about age twenty back then, would have had to assume the leadership of his family at that young age and to bury his father. War and the death of his father might be things, which added to too much power too early, might have made him into the nasty character he is. That story might need some twists and they shouldn't be too hard to come up with, but let's not dwell into them here.
But then I think Tancred should be originally from somewhere else. He has been the kind of leader there until now and he is a highly ranked commander from the war. Right. But how about he is originally from Westfold or from the Fords of Isen - and at last coming back from the war he found his home and village burnt down by the Dunledings / Saruman's orcs, and none alive in the whole village?
Now king Eomer might have wished to show honour to his great captain and help him with his loss by giving him a vacant rich farm from the Mid Emnet? And thus he would have moved in - with possibly a later found original servant or even a child! (I'd love the idea he had a daughter who had escaped the Dunledings and found his dad after five years or something, but yes, let's see if we have use for these complexities)
Whatever, Tancred would be like 55 now (if Eodwine and Athanar are forty-somethings). Still in good health and top intelligence if not in a top form anymore. But with his charisma and commanding stature he would do away with any challenge he might face at Mid Emnet (aided by a handful of eorlinga riding for him). Unless Eodwine or Athanar can prove it otherwise...
But then I got also an idea for Friduhelm. I mean why is he different, why is he not that happy to go with the others even if he clearly is binded to them and has more or less followed their ways until giving the lordship of his house to his son?
Let's create some psychological skeletons to help us with that.
Tancred made war as a great commander and beat the enemy at the Pelennor fields. When he got home he realised it had been for nothing to himself as all his efforts hadn't saved his family. Despite the victory of the nation he felt he had lost everything he had - which is kind of true. So he grew nihilistic or at least cold of emotions to shut the tragedy out from his mind. And that might then explain how he was able to turn into an oppressive "landlord" at his late years. A bitter old man who thought he owed anyone nothing and that others owed him everything...
Alboin was shocked in a similar vein, but being so young when all this happened and brining the corpse of his father back to his home he had only been given all the responsibilities and troubles of leading the family, when he would have just wished to cry for his dad. Now why Eodwine thought him a coward might come important here: maybe it was partly because of Alboin's cowardice his father died? In that situation he would be haunted by his bad conscience - and even if many people carry that kind of loads for no good reason - they feel very real for those who carry them. And that would be the starting point of his "downfall" into a brutal exploitation of his surrounding farmers and trying to raise his status...
Friduhelm in turn could have been like Tancred's second in command or something along the lines during the war: like that they would have been really close and admired each other (at least Athanar thought highly of him and I think it was written somewhere that Eodwine both knew and honoured him as well). So Friduelm - who had been able to come back to a family - had not faced such troubles the other two had and stayed sane on his mind. So even if a war-experience always tends to leave it's mark on people, and Friduhelm surely had his own problems, he never got into that mode Tancred and Alboin got into. But appreciating Tancred so much he didn't wish or dare to rise up against him (and we could come up with endeless possibilities to the nuances of this storyline) and in the end rather gave up his lordship to his son to "wash his hands" from everything he saw happening. Lord Athanar's visit might have awaken him from that state, but if he will be killed because of that... then that's bad (but a good story).
What did I say? A short version then?
