Work Text:
The sky was pale.
Sauron stood on the dome of his temple as his gaze sailed across the aisle, to the west. Approaching was the flood. Besieged by the smokes and sparks of the arsenal, all that could be sensed was the scent of war; unlike those who have unwillingly sworn to offer their lives to fight for their authority, the priest, sorrowfully, indulged himself into the unseen foam of iron, of fire, of Angband, of his fallen empire.
How long, if he did not lose the ability to recall from the very first era, has it been since the last day in which he perceived the flavor of conflict? The northern fortress was still standing then, not smashed into ashes, not blown into the void, not pressed under the arctic… and Melkor was there, too. Ruled by the immortals, his realm was of power and pride – the Elves would have said otherwise, yet they were nothing but pitiful puppets shaped by the great lord himself – and now it’s buried deep under the sea, into the chapters of history.
Drops of rain slid down Sauron’s cheek. Or perhaps it was tears. Perhaps it was the last bit of Melkor that was left inside him. He has always enjoyed the smell of steel accompanied by blood. Charming, as though he was not waiting for his doom in Numenor, but dominating the middle earth in his distant, long gone kingdom.
“Destiny is a loop, is it not?” Melkor whispered to him before the fall, “I have thought of many things. I have tried to cover my mistake with another mistake.”
It was somewhere between three thousand to three thousand five hundred years ago when he lost him. He lost his sensation of time shortly after. The Vala was right. Sauron laughed mockingly. Fate has tricked him. He was given hope when all hopes were lost, then when he regained what he had longed for and when the world was within his hands, it was abruptly taken away.
The storm was ashen.
Seawater was blown to him by the wind. It was Eru’s anger. Deceitful as Sauron was, taking the camouflage of a sheep – with fangs – under the ruling of Pharazon, then stirring up that spark of ambition in his king’s heart. His plans went well, but he was unable to predict Eru’s interference. For ages he has remained silent, when Melkor stole the Silmarils from the despicable Elves, when the North was rising, when he constructed the rings of power… It seemed to the livings on the middle earth that, as if, Eru was to let the chapters go on and on by themselves, ignoring the disturbing notes of Melkor and the worship of him as a deity.
Coward. All that he was capable of was punishing the defenseless. Sauron’s anger took over, yet it was not worthy of mentioning being compared to Eru’s. He had no choice but to desert the island. He might have had to desert his flesh. There was no escape, and he knew that. Eru did, as well. Thunder growled by his ears. He flew into the sky, but it was not the ground that was shaking. It was Arda, the planet. Eru’s clouds chased him, forming spirals around Sauron’s robe, tearing him, biting him, thousands of tiny claws grasping, dragging him down.
There – There he saw it – the lightning was magenta.
And it was bright. For one second, the priest thought his sight was snatched away. Then, not until several seconds later did he see scenes of himself in the first age, depraved from Valinor and deluded to the north. How naive , he thought, nevertheless he would not have changed his mind. The scenes faded into darkness, and in the void of the darkness he saw a magnificent entrance surrounded by the cold fire. It was like a crack in the ground of Arda, like a crack in his heart. It was like Angband. The air was stagnant, and inside the fog stood Melkor. He was there, yet he was not. He could not be retrieved.
The sky disappeared behind the wall of waves. The foam rose and moved and charged at him, engulfing the world along its way.
The blood was scarlet.
It was the Vala’s ichor. Despite being covered in the liquid, eagerly, Sauron rushed towards his deity, but there was a veil that separated them. Melkor’s shadow walked slowly away as the desperate howls of Sauron rebounded in the fortress. He could not hear them.
The flood crushed him. The knives of bubbles, fluid, and hatred penetrated through him. Panicking, screaming, gasping for air, the twister of the ocean swept him furtherly downwards. Give in, he was told , accept death as a mortal and you will be sent to Valinor. There you will be expelled from Arda into the void. There you will see your deity again.
Even so he resisted. He did not wish to meet his lord just to confess how he managed to fail the mission of dominating Arda. Years ago when Angband fell, he chose to linger in this world, betting with all that he had and all those that he would, that the lord may return. Years later he remained still, preparing for the arrival of his one and only belief, and for which he was willing to give up eternally his form of body.
I shall climb a mountain of blades or plunge into a sea of flames, undergo the most severe trails, just to take a glimpse of our past.
Dooms are to come, and desire, too. Sauron escaped from his flesh into the naked form of a beam of fragile light, and was soon swallowed by the sea. War was to be declared upon the despicable Elves once he recovered from the tsunami. How foolish of Eru was it to assume that it would break his will!
No more mercy shall be granted. Filthy gore was meant to be split.
Be it fortune or Misfortune, there was no turning back.