Chapter Text
“Look at me!”
A sharp jolt shot through Galadriel and she stumbled. Where moments before she had been surrounded by rolling green hills and the sweet scent of home, she now stared out at endless blue sky and water. The makeshift raft beneath her bare feet bobbed gently against the soft waves.
“Galadriel. Look at me.”
The voice came from behind her. It was Halbrand’s voice, but it did not belong to any man named Halbrand, for Halbrand did not exist.
“You know who I am,” he said, as though hearing her thoughts. “I am your friend.”
She turned away from the sea to look at him—at the Deceiver, the liar, the traitor. “You are a friend of Morgoth’s.”
The words pained her, the betrayal cutting deeper than she could ever admit. He had been her friend—maybe even something more, though she did not have a word for it. But that had been a lie. A lie born from her own ambition. Her own stubbornness and arrogance.
Halbrand—Sauron—she did not know what to call him—rose to his feet. He looked exactly like he had when they first met on the Sundering Seas. Roguishly handsome for a man, despite his current station. Wet, cold, dressed in a low man’s tatters. Even that pendant—that lie—dangled around his neck, as if to mock her for her own foolishness. It was a near perfect illusion of the first time they had met, adrift at sea with nothing but this ramshackle raft and the mutual need for survival.
“When Morgoth was defeated,” he began, “it was if a great, clenched fist had released its grasp from my neck. And in the stillness of that first sunrise…at last…” He smiled, his eyes shining bright. “I felt the light of The One again. And I knew if ever I was to be forgiven that I had to heal everything that I had helped ruin.”
If Galadriel had not known him capable of such deceit, she would have believed his repentance, this promise of hope. But she knew better now.
“No penance could ever erase the evil you have done,” she told him.
He had the nerve to almost look hurt. “That is not what you believe.”
“Do not tell me what I believe,” she said angrily.
“No. You told me—after our victory, you said that whatever I had done before, I could be free of it.”
“You deceived me!” she said in exasperation.
“I told you the truth,” he insisted. “I told you that I had done evil, and you did not care. Because you knew that our past meant nothing weighed against our future.”
She stared at him, hating that there was truth to his words, that he was using them against her. “There is no such future.”
He scanned her face, and when he spoke, his words were gentle. “Isn’t there.” He watched her another moment before glancing toward the water.
Galadriel followed his gaze. After a second of hesitation, she took a step closer to the edge of the raft and looked down.
It was as though peering into a mirror. She watched as their reflections in the water rippled, and then shifted into what unmistakably appeared to be a silhouette of a crowned king and his queen.
Of them.
Of Galadriel and Sauron, side by side. Together.
She could not properly describe what she felt as she stared into this reflection—into this potential future. Despite all that was logical and sensible, she could not stop staring at it, at their dark silhouettes cast against the glowing, golden light.
“All others look on you with doubt,” he said to her. “I alone can see your greatness.” She felt him move—felt him reach out, gently taking her chin and guiding her gaze back to his. “I alone can see your light.”
Fighting by his side, she had felt it—that powerful, unexplainable cosmic force that she could not quite define or name. Should a crown be placed upon their heads, they could do such great and terrible things. They could shatter Middle-earth and bring every dark foe to their knees.
“You would make me a tyrant,” Galadriel said.
“I would make you a queen.” He smiled slightly, his hazel eyes glowing with light. “Fair as the sea and the sun. Stronger than the foundations of the earth.”
And she would be. Fair and strong and mighty. Beautiful and terrible as the dawn, and he would be no better for it. Worse, she knew.
“And you, my king,” she said softly. “The Dark Lord.”
“No,” he replied, just as gently, “not dark. Not with you at my side.” He lowered his hand and took a step back, his eyes searching hers, as though desperate for her to see. “You told me once that we were brought together for a purpose.” He pressed the hilt of her dagger into her palm, wrapping his hands around her own, so that they wielded it together, as one. “This is it. You bind me to light. And I bind you to power. Together, we can save this Middle-earth.”
He made it sound so simple, so easy, so tempting. And it was. To reshape Middle-earth the way it should be, the way it ought to be to forever keep the dark forces at bay. But to do so could only mean one thing.
Galadriel took a tentative step closer. “Save…or rule?”
He looked at her a moment, scanning her face. “I see no difference.”
She could hear the sincerity in which he spoke, and it was those words that cut the final tether she had been grasping. Because Halbrand would have seen a difference.
But Halbrand—her ally, her friend—was truly gone.
Galadriel pulled the dagger free and pressed it to the side of his throat, forcing his chin up slightly. “And that is why,” she breathed, “I will never be at your side.”
He glanced down at the dagger, then slowly shifted his gaze back to hers. His expression was impossible to read. “You have no choice.” That once hopeful voice was now replaced with something colder. “Without me, your people will fade, and the shadow will spread and darken to cover all over the world.” As he spoke, the clouds blackened behind him threateningly, lighting flashing and thunder cracking. “You need me.”
“I should have left you on the sea,” she seethed.
“The sea that you were on because the elves cast you out,” he rallied back. “They cast you out for deigning to beg them for a few petty soldiers.”
Stop, she silently begged him.
“What will they do when you tell them that you were my ally?”
A tear slipped down her cheek.
“When you tell them that Sauron lives, B E C A U S E O F Y O U ?” he bellowed, his voice distorting and echoing like thunder.
“And you will die because of me!” Galadriel screamed.
Sauron roared in fury, his face contorting to something dark and monstrous, and she swung her dagger toward him with a cry of her own—
And then she was plummeting into the cold water, choking on her own scream.
Lightning flashed across the sky like a whip, thunder echoing high above. Tethered to a piece of wood, arms bound behind her with rope, Galadriel thrashed, fighting against the binds that held her captive, the dagger gripped in her hand all but useless from this position.
Useless, just as she was, as she continued to sink lower and lower.
Like the stone that could only see downward, Galadriel stared down into the deep dark, into its endless depths, the inevitable darkness calling to her, as it always had. She could not tell which way was up or down, surrounded by emptiness and cold and death. The pull was irresistible, nearly impossible for her to resist, and she could do nothing but let it swallow her whole.
Because she had followed the wrong light, and now—now there was only darkness.
She stopped struggling. Let the water fill her lungs, her vision blacken. She deserved no less.
You have fought long enough, Galadriel.
She did not know who spoke the words in her mind. It could have been her brother, or Elrond, or Sauron. Possibly herself.
Put up your sword.
She wanted to. She wanted to desperately. She was so, so tired. But—
Without it, what am I to be?
What you have always been.
Who was she? Commander. Deserter. Daughter. Fool. What did it matter now, when all that was light and good would turn to ash and shadow—because of her?
Why do you keep fighting?
The question rang in her mind, in a voice she did not know. Louder and louder, over and over.
Why do you keep fighting?
Why do you keep fighting?
Why do you keep fighting?
Galadriel’s eyes shot open, and suddenly she was no longer bound, but free, and she paddled and kicked upward with all her remaining strength. Up and up, she swam out of the darkness toward the light, past the pain in her chest, past the blackness at the edge of her sight. Close, so close now she could almost touch sky, through light and dark and dark and light.
And light and dark and dark…and light…and dark…and…
…
..
.
Galadriel shot up and gasped, spluttering and coughing up a lungful of sea water.
Movement. Voices. Murmurs. Wind. Cold. She heard everything and nothing, her vision cloudy, her throat raw from screaming and choking.
“She’s alive. Pass me the water.”
“No. Answers first.”
“Give her moment to catch her breath, Eamon. The girl nearly drowned.”
“And drowned she should’ve stayed.”
“We could not just leave her adrift—”
“The tides of fate are flowing.”
Galadriel’s daze and disorientation sharpened with heightened focus. Her head snapped in the direction of that voice—at his voice.
Halbrand. Sauron.
Dripping wet, and painfully familiar, he pulled a tattered cloak around his shoulders. He was looking at her with mild curiosity, but absolutely no recognition. Like he had not just tried to drown her in her own mind. “Yours may be coming in, or out.”
She was too stunned to do anything but stare at him. His brown hair was soaking wet, as though he had been the one in the water, the pendant tucked into the front of his shirt. His lips were chapped from the wind, a cut under his left eye scabbed and healing.
The longer she stared, the quicker her shock transformed to utter rage, but before she could act on it, a man knelt at her side and said, “Why are you out here?”
His familiar voice halted her fury and drew her attention. Galadriel looked at him and recalled his face clearly. He wore the same leather cap, had the same pale, splotchy skin and distrusting eyes.
A strong, strange sense of déjà vu forced Galadriel to shut her eyes tightly. But when she opened them again, her surroundings did not change, and she was staring into the desolate, sunken faces of—of humans. Of familiar humans, on a familiar raft, on a familiar sea.
She scrambled to her feet and stumbled back. She could make no sense of it other than she must still be trapped in her own mind. She looked to Halbrand—Sauron—again, expecting to see a slight taunt to his lips, a gleam in his hazel eyes, a satisfaction at seeing her going mad. But he was only looking at her exactly as he had when they first met on this raft: distrusting, wary, and mildly curious.
Get out of my mind.
“Get out,” she breathed, closing her eyes once more.
But even as she said it, she knew this was different. The chill of the wind brushing her cheeks…it reminded her that everything in Sauron’s illusions had been a perfect rendering of Valinor and the Sundering Seas—except for the warmth. And although gray clouds still loomed overhead, it was warmer now than it had been in her mind. Evil and dark magic could feel no warmth.
“What?” the man asked, drawing her attention back to him once more. “I say, why are you out here? Were you attacked?”
Attacked? By what—
A memory flashed. The screams, the panic, the sounds of bodies being torn apart and wood splintering.
“The worm,” Galadriel breathed. The other woman on the raft whimpered louder at the mention of the beast. Dread, hot and searing, filled Galadriel’s chest.
No. No, this was not possible. Was not—
“Look! Look there,” the whimpering woman cried, pointing wildly. “We are saved!”
“Help us!” the other woman yelled. “Over here!”
“Wait! Wait until we can see the sails.”
Galadriel felt as though she were reliving a dream—or a nightmare. But it was not a dream or a nightmare, she realized, as another familiar memory floated back to her. Except it was not a real memory, but a promise of one.
I know what it is to be the only one, the only one who sees, the only one who knows.
The only one who sees.
And suddenly she knew with absolute clarity that she was not trapped in an illusion, a prison of her own mind, or a cruel dream. She never had been. Not truly.
Galadriel had—had never gotten onto this raft until now. All that she had seen, all that she had done—a warning of what could be. Like dreams, which could feel so long but only last but a few moments, her vision had done the same, coming to her in the moments in which she had all but drowned. She could hardly wrap her mind around it, around the truth of what she knew to be, the knowledge in which she now carried.
The threat of what could come to pass.
“We must jump from this raft,” Galadriel breathed quietly, more to herself than to the others.
“Are you mad?” one of them barked.
“If you wish to survive,” she said, more firmly this time, “you will do as I say. That is no ship.”
She looked to her old friend and oldest of foes, who was watching her with keen eyes. Her own darted to the rope in his hands. Already, he was planning his escape.
She had seconds. Seconds to decide what to do.
Seconds was not long enough.
Before she could so much as formulate any semblance of a plan, the others started to scream and scramble at the realization that it was not a ship approaching, and in her distracted state she was knocked off the raft.
Galadriel slammed into the water hard, twisting beneath the surface and opening her eyes to see the large, spiked fins of the worm as it reared toward the raft. She resurfaced and paddled hard in the opposite direction without looking back. Heard the screams, the crunching and shattering of wood, of bodies being torn apart. She swam a good distance before turning back, her heart thundering in her chest.
She watched and waited with dread.
Perhaps he hadn’t survived. Perhaps this time, the worm would come for her next.
She waited, and waited, but no worm came, and then she saw it.
What remained of the raft looked like a jagged crown as it emerged from the heavy, dense fog. And there he was, paddling through it—toward her, as he had done before. The only survivor once more.
Galadriel did not swim to the raft, not this time. She stayed where she was, treading, allowing her a moment to think.
Her rash behavior, quick temper, and blinded vengeance had led her to nothing but pain and failure. If she were to save Middle-earth, to prevent her vision from coming true, she needed to be very, very careful. And she needed more time to think.
He drew the raft closer, threw down the paddle, and moved to the edge to loom over her.
Galadriel stared up at him, wishing to do nothing more than drag him into the sea and drown him the way he had tried to do to her. Even if it was not real, it had felt real, and he deserved to feel that pain and panic—that utter hopelessness. She was sure the contempt shone on her face, despite her best efforts to hide it.
After a brief pause, he reached down, offering to pull her up.
How many times had they clasped hands? Offered their hand to the other?
Galadriel knew she had no other choice. She hesitated only a moment before allowing him to pull her onto the raft. She grunted, then collapsed on her knees, exhausted from it all. Reaching for the waterskin, she drank eagerly, her throat burning and raw.
“Didn’t peg you for an Elf,” he said, his voice a bit winded from his efforts. The tips of her ears must be peeking through her hair.
“Looks can be deceiving,” Galadriel replied without looking at him.
“Indeed. What are you called?”
She was breathing hard from the swim, staring out over the water. Words that she had spoken in a dim dungeon suddenly rang back to her.
Ours was no chance meeting. Not fate, nor destiny, nor any other words Men use to speak of the forces they lack the conviction to name.
Ours was the work of something greater.
Something greater was at work here, something beyond Elf or Man’s understanding. Galadriel’s brother had vowed to seek Sauron out and destroy him, and when he died, that vow had become hers. The future she had seen showed her that she had failed in her task. Had inadvertently placed a crown upon his head and put him on a path of great and terrible power. But if one thing she was certain, it was that the future was ever changing, paths forged and reformed upon every choice, every decision.
This vision would not come to pass. Even if she had to bend fate to her will, she would not allow it.
Galadriel turned, facing the man who was no man, who she once called a friend who was—who had always been—her enemy. “Galadriel,” she told him.
After a beat, he said, “I’m Halbrand.”
She turned away, least her expression give her away. She feared he would sense the hate she now felt, the pain amplified by the cold sting of his betrayal, of who and what he was. If she were to deceive Sauron, the Deceiver himself, she would need to master herself. She would need to wait.
Because if she had learned anything, it was that justice and vengeance required patience, not haste. In time, she would fulfill her vow and destroy him. For now, she needed to keep him close. And she could not, under any circumstances, draw his suspicions. In her own mind, she must not forget who he was, but cast the name Sauron aside, as to not reveal her own deception.
“Halbrand,” Galadriel said.
He grabbed the paddle and cast her a sidelong glance. “What’s our heading?”
Evil did not sleep. It waited.
And so would she.
"We go south."