Chapter Text
He lay broken on the cold forest floor, his body slick with blood, surrounded by the very children he had once cherished. They had fallen upon him like rabid dogs, and above their trembling forms stood Sauron, a cruel smile curving his lips.
“They are no longer children,” Sauron said.
In that moment, regret surged through him like a blade to the heart, sharp and merciless. He had failed. Failed to shield his children from Sauron’s deceit, failed to guard them against his poisoned whispers. Galadriel had been right: he had given Sauron the army he had not possessed before. Through his blindness, his arrogance—his failure—they were once more enslaved.
How had he let himself be lured back into Sauron’s grasp, despite all he had endured, all his long years had taught him? One last question seared through his mind: Will they ever be able to destroy him?
Then his breath left him, and the world sank into darkness deeper than the blackest night...
…until he was drawn suddenly into a tunnel suffused with blinding light. Endless radiance poured down, a river of brilliance cleaving the dark. He felt weightless, carried as though by unseen hands, floating ever forward. Yet as he drifted, shadowy figures began to appear along the walls of the tunnel—faces luminous and beautiful, though blurred; bodies barely outlined, moving with a rhythm that felt older than time itself.
Then came the voices. At first, only a murmur, but soon single words broke free of the haze: Light. Protect. Darkness. Come. They spoke to him, though their meaning remained veiled. Still, warmth spread through him, a long-forgotten comfort, and with it came something he had not known in centuries. Peace. Pure, unbroken peace. And in that peace, a desperate wish: that he might remain here forever.
But the tunnel widened, immeasurable, and the radiance softened, dissolving into dusk.
*
Slowly, Adar opened his eyes.
Beneath him lay a cool forest floor. Around him the leaves whispered in the wind, and the lonely call of an owl drifted through the twilight—as if the spirit world itself had sent a herald to mark a coming change. The place was hauntingly familiar, so like the forest where his children had slain him. For a moment, he thought he had only fallen unconscious, that he was waking at last.
But he was whole. Entirely uninjured. And yet—different.
Could the Valar truly have granted him a second chance? The thought was absurd. A bitter laugh slipped past his lips. Rising to his feet, he touched his face. The scars remained, but the rest of him was intact, as if death had never claimed him. Only the forest had shifted. It looked the same, yet it was not. His sharpened senses told him so—the air less pure, the earth beneath his feet harder, heavier, wrong.
Far off in the distance, lights shimmered. Not torches. Not candles. They glowed with unnatural clarity, steady and fierce, unlike anything he had ever known.
In all his long life, he had seen wonders without number, terrors beyond count—but never this. He felt no anchor, no memory of a place even remotely akin to this one. Its scents, its silence, its very pulse were foreign.
Something was wrong here. Utterly, terrifyingly wrong.
All of a sudden, his body tensed. Instinct pulled him into the shadows of the trees as footsteps sounded nearby.
A woman emerged.
Even from afar she struck him: beauty and grace draped about her like a cloak. Her silhouette gleamed faintly, touched by something otherworldly. Long dark hair spilled over her shoulders, streaked with strands of pale gold that caught the moonlight like threads of fire. Each soft curl shifted as she walked. Moonlight lit her eyes until they burned like twin stars; her skin gleamed pale and flawless. She was not tall—perhaps a head shorter than he—but there was a quiet power in her stride that made her presence larger than life.
Her figure was slender, but distinctly, irresistibly feminine, far more so than any elf he had ever known. She was human, undeniably human. And yet she moved with a poise, an elegance that stole the breath from his lungs. In that instant, he knew: he wanted her.
A raven burst from the branches above, its harsh cry tearing the silence. The woman flinched, startled, and her gaze snapped toward him. Their eyes met. Blue-green irises flecked with gold locked on his face—widening in shock, horror, disbelief.
And all he thought was: I could drown in those eyes.
The spell shattered as she turned and fled, her scream piercing the night. She was swift, but he was swifter. In a few long strides he was upon her. He seized her from behind, lifted her with ease, and pressed her against him, one hand closing firmly over her mouth.
For now, he could allow no unnecessary attention.