Morgai

Hard and cruel and bitter was the land that met his gaze. Before his feet the highest ridge of the Ephel Dúath fell steeply in great cliffs down into a dark trough, on the further side of which there rose another ridge, much lower, its edge notched and jagged with crags like fangs that stood out black against the red light behind them: it was the grim Morgai, the inner ring of the fences of the land. Far beyond it, but almost straight ahead, across a wide lake of darkness dotted with tiny fires, there was a great burning glow; and from it rose in huge columns a swirling smoke, dusty red at the roots, black above where it merged into the billowing canopy that roofed in all the accursed land.

Sam was looking at Orodruin, the Mountain of Fire. Ever and anon the furnaces far below its ashen cone would grow hot and with a great surging and throbbing pour forth rivers of molten rock from chasms in its sides. Some would flow blazing towards Barad-dûr down great channels; some would wind their way into the stony plain, until they cooled and lay like twisted dragon-shapes vomited from the tormented earth. In such an hour of labour Sam beheld Mount Doom, and the light of it, cut off by the high screen of the Ephel Dúath from those who climbed up the path from the West, now glared against the stark rock faces, so that they seemed to be drenched with blood.

J. R. R. Tolkien: The Lord of the Rings. Book VI, Chapter 1, The Tower of Cirith Ungol

For the prompt "Ridge" I was thinking about the numerous ridges across Middle-earth but interestingly I haven't found many that would play a prominent role in the narrative. But when I re-read this scene when Sam and the reader sees Mordor for the first time, it really struck me with the vivid imagery. I love how even a seemingly minor geographical feature such as the inner ridge of Ephel Dúath plays part in this scenery. So I knew I had to draw a picture of it.

It is an ink drawing using a brush pen for the solid black areas and then coloured and shaded with watercolour pencils.