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"Why would you want to go back?!"
It came at Celebrimbor unceasingly from every quarter. His mother, the few friends he'd allowed to see him, every former follower of his father who imagined some right to speak in Curufin's absence. Even Glorfindel, who surely ought to be answering that question himself, demanded explanation.
Celebrimbor wasn't sure it should even be called a want. He'd felt little of anything since leaving Mandos. Nothing so strong as to resemble real desire. Only a stone-solid certainty that his path forward lay not in Aman, but in the land that had brought him to Annatar once and might again. Finrod alone looked at him with something like understanding, clasped his shoulder warmly, and said, "Well, if you must go, then you go."
When Manwë asked the same question, Celebrimbor offered everything he'd spent the last months preparing. How he'd helped to unleash Sauron on the world, and felt he had become in some measure his responsibility. How extensive and useful his knowledge of him would prove in tracking him down, now that he'd perhaps resurfaced. He did not say, "I don't know how to stop loving him." He did not say, "I'm not sure I want to try."
He thought Manwë might see regardless the truths locked away in his heart, too distant to touch but inerasable, but if he did, he said nothing of it. Celebrimbor was granted a place on the ship.
For many years, Celebrimbor wandered, sometimes in the company of Olórin or Pallando, but increasingly on his own. Constant rumours skittered from ear to ear about wraiths and shadows and gathering menace, and Celebrimbor investigated each one. Sauron was never there.
Once, and only once, he ventured into the ruins of Ost-in-Edhil. No one had ever built there again, despite the human kingdoms that had sprung up across Eriador. Stones lay where they had fallen amidst siege weapons and fire. Moss grew on their softened edges now. Ash and blood alike had washed away, and yet their absence felt somehow stranger. He roamed where streets had been, where he and Annatar had walked together in love and happiness, or so he'd thought. He traced the remains of the Guild Hall, the forge where they had worked side by side in perfect tune with one another. He came upon the broken cellar where Annatar had held and tortured him, and there he fell to his knees, gasping and retching, and when he'd emptied his stomach, he was shaking too hard to rise. The dizziness that had plagued him since his re-embodiment blotted out the edges of his vision. Maybe it hadn't been the best idea, coming alone.
Part of him, the part that had always felt too much hope, had imagined Annatar meeting him at those fallen gates once more. But the only ghosts he found were the ones he had brought with him. He could almost be a ghost himself. He returned to Rivendell and Elrond's warm hospitality with holly in his hair and nothing to report.
*
The hill fortress of Dol Guldur looked far older than it was. Rot seemed to bubble from its walls; there was nothing wholesome about its decay, like the weathering stones of Eregion. The moat was clogged with algae, and the treacherous boards of the drawbridge creaked and groaned beneath Celebrimbor's feet. The stench of it made him gag.
No one had offered to accompany him; the eyes of the wise were turned on the new foe of Angmar and its looming threat. Elrond and Glorfindel had supposed the Witch-king was a cover for Sauron, or his puppet, bearing the visible labors while Sauron's strength recovered and armies gathered to him. Celebrimbor might have been wrong, he knew, but he'd had a feeling that he would recognize Sauron whatever form he took, and that Angmar might be a cover, but it was not hiding Sauron's presence within. Olórin had studied Celebrimbor from under his huge, bushy eyebrows and nodded silently when he declared where he was headed instead.
Thus he'd gone once more in search of rumours, and slipped through rumour's gate with a quiet and well-practiced song of concealment on his lips. A few Orcs patrolled the walls, but it had been laughably easy to walk inside. The halls he explored now were empty and silent, unnerving in their desolation. The lonely ache in his chest throbbed as he went from room to sepulchral room.
At the top of a crumbling spire, he opened a door and found a dimly-lit bedchamber. A still figure lay within the musty canopies. At first Celebrimbor thought it was a corpse. The only indication otherwise was the almost imperceptible rise and fall of its chest. The skin had lost its warm golden glow, and had become almost transparent, or fissured in places as if it was rotting away like the fortress around them. Bruises bloomed beneath it, and blue veins lined the neck and withered hands. The hair had thinned and faded, and what remained was straw-like wisps.
Celebrimbor wasn't sure how he'd expected to feel when he came face-to-face with the lover who'd tortured and killed him, but the strong urge to care for him wasn't it. He dropped his enchantment.
"Annatar?" He spoke quietly, as if shattering the silence was unforgivable.
Dull eyes flicked to him from sunken hollows that seeped an inky liquid. The figure did not move. "Tyelpë," he croaked. There was no surprise in it. "Come to yell at me again? You don't usually call me that anymore."
"No, I don't--I--" The bottom had fallen out of his stomach, and he wasn't sure how to go on holding himself together. "I called you that to the end."
"It's all right, my love," Sauron continued, tiredly, inexorably. "I know you're angry with me. As long as you're here, I don't care. I'm sorry I lost your skull, you know. Did I tell you that already? I think I did. You were always more cruel when I was holding it, but I don't mind. I miss it anyway. I didn't lose it on purpose; useless ringwraiths couldn't find it in the wreckage of our tower. Useless. Can't find my ring, either. I'm sorry, Tyelpë. Stay anyway, won't you?" Tears were beginning to trickle down his cheeks, leaving dark stained tracks in their wake. He made no move to stem them. "Please don't vanish yet. You always go too soon. Yell at me all you like, just please don't vanish."
Celebrimbor raised a hand to his mouth. How long had his seeming lingered here, an apparition, a hallucination, a dream?
"I won't vanish this time. I promise." In a moment of his own madness, he crossed the room and knelt beside the bed. As gently as he could, he settled his hand over Sauron's.
Sauron blinked up at him. "I can't usually feel you," he murmured, almost too softly to be heard. A tiny smile graced his cracked lips for a moment. "You were telling me last week how much you hate this place, but here you are back. It won't be like this forever. I'll make it beautiful for you if you only say the word. When I'm stronger. I'll make a whole kingdom for you when I've got my ring back, and I'll bring you back to life this time--I know, I know, but this time it will work; I've had some new ideas..."
"Annatar." Trying to keep his voice steady, Celebrimbor carefully pulled Sauron's gaunt hand--missing a finger, he realized--between his and squeezed ever so lightly. "I'm here. I'm alive. I've come back in truth."
"Dearest, that's beyond cruel. I know I said you could be as cruel as you please, but don't you think that's a bit much?" He sighed. "Never mind me. Say what you like as long as you keep talking."
"I came back to Middle-earth as soon as I could. I wasn't finished with you. I came to find you. I couldn't not."
"Please don't," Sauron whispered. "He wouldn't. I know you're not real."
"Well, I hope you have food and a bed to offer me anyway. It was a long walk, and I'm getting tired of waybread." The bravado came easily; his dread and the satisfaction of finding what he had long sought both existed at a far and numb remove.
Sauron studied his hands, turning them over, tracing his fingers where the only callouses were from Glorfindel pushing him to practice with a blade. "You're warm."
Celebrimbor could see the exact moment Sauron began to believe him. A note of wild and inescapable joy crossed his face, and it immediately gave way to fear.
"You've come for revenge, then."
"No--"
"I won't try to stop you. Do what you will. If I can make but one request--I would beg for an hour with you before you kill me."
"I don't want to kill you. What would you do with an hour, anyway?"
"I want to hear everything. Starting with why you haven't touched a hammer since you've returned."
"It hasn't exactly been--easy--to think of setting foot in a forge again."
"Oh."
Suddenly Celebrimbor wanted any other topic of conversation. "What are you doing lying here in all this mold and mildew? That can't be good for you."
"It just does this. I can't stop it."
"Will the sunlight hurt you?"
Sauron hesitated, and it occurred to Celebrimbor that he might not give a true answer.
"I'm going to open the windows unless it will make you worse."
"Go ahead."
Action felt good, and the day outside was pleasant and warm. Pulling back the curtains and throwing open the shutters brought a little more life into the room.
"All right. Now tell me why you're sick." There was no chair, and perhaps it was overly familiar for their new circumstances, but Sauron didn't seem to mind when he took a seat on the foot of the bed.
Sauron huffed. "Dying isn't without consequences for me either."
"I understand that, but I thought...I don't know. People seemed to believe you'd remain a spirit until you were strong enough to take your usual form."
"Without some outside help, without the power I placed in my ring? Recovery is excruciatingly slow. An unembodied spirit changes only with great difficulty. With a body, it goes faster. I can interact with the world and let material things act on me. But it isn't comfortable, and the state of me shows through. What you see is what I am, for now. And now you know of my weakness."
"Are you eating enough? Do you have a healer here?" It was easier, for the moment, to pack away his anger and his fear. He had no idea what to do with them, but this at least felt natural. "You really don't look--" The spell came on faster than usual. The world began to narrow around the edges, and before he could move, it all went dark.
When he came to, he was lying on the floor, and Sauron was holding his hand from over the edge of the bed. He jerked away, and Sauron retreated to his place, lying back gingerly, his breath harsh and ragged.
"I kept you from hitting your head," he gasped out. The brief effort had utterly exhausted him, and Celebrimbor wasn't sure what to make of that. Then it fully sank in that he'd been unconscious and helpless in the same room as Sauron.
"What the fuck, Tyelpë?"
His throat was constricting, and he couldn't seem to breathe. He watched it happen as if from far away, unable to stop the process or do anything but ride it out. Sauron did not move again, but by the time Celebrimbor's lungs decided to work, he looked profoundly sorrowful in a way Celebrimbor didn't dare trust.
"Mandos never should have let you go." His voice was weaker than before. "You're nowhere near ready to hold a body again. What was he thinking?!"
"I don't faint often," Celebrimbor said, affronted. "Maybe I need a body in order to recover too; have you thought of that? Or do you generally consider yourself a better expert than the Valar at their own jobs?"
He knew that would irritate Annatar, and it was nice to watch the reaction play out as expected, but Sauron cut himself off instead of sniping back. "Your spirit and body are barely hanging together. It would take incredibly little distress to send you right back."
Celebrimbor grinned. "I guess you won't get as much fun out of torturing me the second time around."
"It wasn't fun." He stared up at the ceiling. "If that's what you thought of me, why did you come?"
There was too much that Celebrimbor was in no wise prepared to say. He shrugged. "What else was I supposed to do?"
They found little to say after that. Sauron summoned and introduced to him two orcs: Naglur, head of the guard, and Muzgâsh, seneschal and head of the house. "See to anything he needs," he told them. "Find him a bedroom and make him comfortable. He's free to leave and has free run of the fortress as long as he doesn't attack anyone." He turned to Celebrimbor. "You won't, of course?"
"Of course. I'm your guest."
Sauron nodded, barely moving his head. "Good. You'll have to excuse me. I'm very tired."
Celebrimbor trailed after the orcs, glancing back only briefly at where Sauron lay, exhausted and frail in a way he could never have imagined Annatar. The room he was shown to was as good as any in the fortress, which was to say smelling damp and growing mushrooms in the corners. He set to cleaning immediately. As long as he kept moving, he didn't have to think. It had worked for him so far, and he had no intentions of giving it up now. He politely declined the meal being served to the small contingent of orcs and took some vegetables he recognized from the stores Muzgâsh showed him, fried them up, and ate them with a little waybread. He didn't have much appetite anyway. After supper, he worked more, pushing himself until the room was livable and he knew he'd be able to fall asleep the moment he closed his eyes. He didn't bother blocking the door. If Sauron wanted him dead, he could do it at any time.
*
"Can I fix things up in here for you?" Celebrimbor asked when he went back the next morning. "It might not help much, but surely you'd feel a little better in more pleasant surroundings."
Sauron studied him silently. "If you can do it without too much noise."
"I'll be as quiet as I can. Let me know if you need me to stop and let you rest."
He began by grabbing all the textiles he could and hauling them out to the courtyard to be washed or aired. On the stairs, he had to pause twice for waves of dizziness that went on and on far longer than he liked. He stuck closer to the wall after, just in case. It was supremely annoying. He'd thought he'd improved since coming to Middle-earth. In all the years he'd spent at Rivendell and in the wilderness, he'd endured occasional dizzy spells and even fainted a few times, but they hadn't been daily since he'd left Aman and the suffocating homes in Tirion of those who loved him dearly but could never understand what drew him back despite everything.
On his way back up, he fetched a bucket of hot soapy water from the kitchens, along with a mop and rags.
"We've tried," Muzgâsh informed him tartly as she grated soap into boiling water for him. "The Master's fortress is not in this state because any of us prefer it. Anything you do will be undone by tomorrow."
"We'll enjoy it for the few hours it lasts, then."
She clicked her tongue at that but said no more. Celebrimbor shifted uneasily. He'd never been so near an orc who wasn't actively trying to kill or hurt him in some way, but Muzgâsh seemed little different from any other seneschal he'd known.
"May I ask you something?" he asked as she finished up.
"Go ahead."
"Do you enjoy your work here? Is he...is it a good life?"
"I'd like it a good sight better if this place weren't set on rotting itself from the inside out. That's what he gets for having the Nazgûl ready it for him. Theirs is no sorcery for the living. But I think you're really asking about my loyalty, and he has it completely."
Celebrimbor supposed he should have expected that. "Thank you." He hefted the bucket, trying not to splash it on himself.
"If you find a way to make it stick, you let me know."
He nodded and headed up the stairs again.
Sauron's eyes followed him silently while he scrubbed the floor at first, but he kept drifting off. Celebrimbor glanced up at him from time to time while he slept. In this state Celebrimbor could likely do him real harm if he chose, and it must take some trust--or simply not caring for his life--to let Celebrimbor remain unwatched. Celebrimbor found himself hoping it was the first. It settled him a little inside to think that Sauron was accepting the same risk Celebrimbor must. He finished eradicating a particularly stubborn spot of some slimy substance he didn't want to think about, and started on the walls.
"Tyelpë. I sewed your chest back up. You know that. There is no cause to go around bleeding like that and ruin your own effort. I put it back."
Celebrimbor spun around, but Sauron was staring into empty air, not at him. He huffed. "I'm over here."
Sauron looked back and forth between him and a spot across the room with an annoyed frown. "Well, your ghost is getting blood all over my rug. It's very rude to be two of you."
Celebrimbor shrugged. "Take it up with him. And it's not like the rug could look much worse. I was considering throwing it out."
"There is nothing wrong with my rug," he hissed.
"It was hideous to start with, and now it's falling apart and looks like it has gangrene. I wouldn't have believed you'd put up with this back in Eregion."
"You have no idea what I put up with in Eregion."
"Me?" Celebrimbor asked before he could stop himself. "Were you just putting up with me for what you could gain?"
The pained and sorrowful expression from before returned, and Celebrimbor had to remind himself it didn't mean anything. Sauron had lied the entire time he'd known him.
"What do you want me to tell you, Celebrimbor? Do you want to hate me? Should I tell you what you need to hear so you can destroy me and find peace?"
"I want the truth."
"The truth? The truth is I can barely live without you. The truth is my mind wanted you so badly it summoned a specter to take your place. I never lied about my feelings for you."
"I don't believe you."
"Why should it be so hard to believe?"
"Because you killed me. Remember that?"
"I remember. I have forgotten nothing of it. I--" He looked past Celebrimbor again. "Yes. Thank you. I don't actually need you to recite every injury for me...no, I don't--Celebrimbor, please..."
"Still right here," Celebrimbor interrupted.
"I'm aware." He closed his eyes, lifting a hand with some effort to rub at his forehead. He quickly opened them again. "Oh, that's worse. I can't tell which of you is talking if I can't see you. No, I don't expect you to feel the same. I had hoped, once, when I thought it would end differently. I know you only hate me now. It's fine."
"I didn't say that," Celebrimbor told him quietly.
"He did."
"My ghost doesn't actually speak for me."
"What then, Tyelpë?" His voice was soft with despair.
"I don't know." He wrung out the rag and draped it over the side of the bucket. Already in the corner he could see a green stain creeping over the floorboards again. "I don't know. I think...I needed to know if any of the man I loved was real. If any part of Annatar was more than a mask. That's why I came. That's what I want." He sat heavily on the side of the bed and rested his arms on his knees. "If you tell me it was all a lie, I'll go. But you talk like it wasn't."
"I don't want you to go, so why would I tell you that? Poor strategizing on your part."
"Fine. Tell me what you want me to believe, and I'll extrapolate."
"Please believe, then, that from the moment I understood who you are, I wanted you by my side forever. That I never wished for your harm. That all I did was in service to the better world we both desired to build. I truly never imagined things would go so far between us."
"You didn't know me as well as you thought."
"No. I suppose not."
"Does it change things, now that you know me more?"
Sauron didn't answer, and after a moment, Celebrimbor shook his head and went back to attacking the mold.
*
Celebrimbor's nightmares swallowed him, and he woke up screaming, his heart pounding out of his chest and his body covered in cold sweat. The echoes of pain he could never quite forget lingered.
"Was that you or your ghost?" Sauron asked when Celebrimbor entered with a tray holding two bowls of bland porridge and a pot of overly strong tea. "I don't like to hear you scream."
The choking fury that had slept unusually long climbed up his throat like a wild creature scrabbling to get out. "Maybe if you hadn't tortured me to death, I wouldn't have nightmares. How terribly inconvenient for you."
"If you hadn't turned against me, I wouldn't have had to torture you."
Ah. There it was. What had he ever expected? He set the tray on the bedside table within easy reach and turned for the door.
"Tyelpë, wait, I didn't mean--I was trying to say I wished you'd slept better. Not that you inconvenienced me." The note of frantic desperation was almost soothing.
It was enough for Celebrimbor to look back, just for a moment. "That's not what I'm angry about."
He spent the day furiously scrubbing his clothes, then his sheets, then the curtains he'd stripped from Sauron's bed. If he never stepped foot in there again, at least everything would be clean for a little while. By the time he'd hung it all up to dry, he was thoroughly exhausted, and the anger was starting to feel more like terrible pain.
He packed his bag, then unpacked it again. He paced up and down halls slimy with mildew, even where he'd just been cleaning, and couldn't help thinking he was attempting the same pointless task with his life. He cooked food he couldn't imagine wanting to eat. When it was ready, he put it on a tray and made his way up the tower. Not because Sauron needed him, he told himself. Any orc could bring him food and take care of what had to be done. But because he'd said he would, and unlike Sauron, his word meant something. He wouldn't leave without at least saying goodbye.
"You didn't eat today, did you," Sauron greeted him quietly.
"So?"
"I don't want you skipping meals."
"What are you going to do to me if I do?" The defiant words dashed out before he could think. He didn't take them back.
Sauron looked like he wanted to snarl in reply, but after a moment he sighed wearily. "I will be sad and worry about you."
Celebrimbor took a steadying breath of his own and sat on the side of the bed, setting the tray carefully between them. "I made food. I'm not sure I can eat."
"I'll try if you will."
Celebrimbor picked up a spoon. The soup he'd thrown together had cabbage and underdone beans and what was left of a picked-over ham hock, and somehow he'd managed to get the seasoning wrong again. Maybe he should just let the orcs cook. It would be more edible. Once he'd started, though, his belly announced itself empty, and each spoonful became a little easier than the last.
They ate in tense silence for a while. Sauron was pushing his soup around more than eating it, not that Celebrimbor could blame him. It wasn't really his problem anyway.
"I don't know what I need to say to fix things," Sauron finally proffered, staring into his bowl as if the answer might be found there. "If there's any fixing it at all."
"If you can't figure it out, it isn't worth anything anyway."
Sauron looked up. "Don't do that, Tyelpë. I don't know what you want. I don't know what you need from me. I think I would want to give it, whatever it is, but I don't want to make things worse. Just tell me."
Celebrimbor closed his eyes and tried to release his hands from the fists they'd curled into. "Well. To begin with. An apology would be nice. For the murder and torture, you know. A sincere one I can actually believe. And then I'd want a promise that you're committed to not doing it again, and furthermore to not pursue ruling others by force any longer." He thought about it, all the pain and betrayal and nightmares, and wondered if he'd ever be able to forgive it. "That would be a good start."
Sauron's fingers had found a loose thread in the coverlet, and he toyed with it, twisting it back and forth and wrapping it around his thumb. "Are you going to apologize for wrecking my designs and withholding my rings?"
"No." He was proud that his voice did not waver, though his body began to tremble. He couldn't make it stop.
"Is there to be no compromise? No mutual give and take?"
"The compromise is that I'm here speaking to you at all."
"You came not to reunite, then, but to demand my surrender."
The trembling was getting stronger, Celebrimbor noted with detachment. His heart was speeding, too. How annoying.
Sauron must have noticed. His face twisted, and at first Celebrimbor couldn't place it. Then he realized he was trying not to cry. "You don't have to be afraid, Tyelpë." He gave up the pretence of finishing his soup and sank back on his pillows. "I don't have the strength to hurt you if I wanted. And I don't."
Celebrimbor retreated to the foot of the bed and wrapped a heavy wool blanket around his shoulders. At least it smelled better since he'd aired them all. His body refused to calm itself, but the weight helped a little.
"Losing you ruined me," Sauron said, as earnestly as he'd ever spoken.
"That was all your choice. You did it to yourself."
"It was tremendously brave of you to come. I do recognize that." His gaze slipped past Celebrimbor to the empty space beside the bedpost. He listened attentively, then shook his head. "I don't think that's true. Not altogether."
"What has my phantom got to say about it?"
"He says you--he--despises me, and he'll never forgive me whatever I do, so there's no point to any of it. But he always says that." He paused, and Celebrimbor could see his strength was failing. "The thing is, Tyelpë, I meant to keep you with me. I meant our triumph to be shared. I knew you'd be hesitant about the details, but you were meant to sit on a throne at my side. None of the rest was supposed to happen, and...I think it's a little unfair to hold it against me alone when none of that should have been necessary. All you ever had to do was give me a chance to show you what could be."
"You didn't have to do it. I didn't make you." Celebrimbor bit his lip, but there was nothing grounding in the slight pain anymore. He wanted to scream in Sauron's face, and despite meeting no hint of a threat since he'd arrived, the potential consequences terrified him. "How long should I give you to think it over and realize how completely unreasonable you're being? A yén? A dozen of them?"
"You are the most stubborn man to ever live."
"No," Celebrimbor said, rising and gathering up the tray. "That would be my grandfather."
*
"You didn't make such a fuss about maneuvering Galadriel out of our way," Sauron said when Celebrimbor arrived with breakfast the next morning. Sleep had come only in fits and starts, and he'd given in and asked Muzgâsh to put something together for them. The lightly sweetened flatbreads were tastier than anything he'd managed lately, and if he didn't think too hard about what might be in the sausage, it went down easily enough too.
"That improved everything, didn't it?" he continued. "My plans would have done the same thing on a grander scale, that's all. Instead of one city, we'd have the world to perfect and bring to the fullness of our vision."
The sausage lost its tentative appeal. "I distinctly recall you making this same argument while you were pulling out my fingernails."
Sauron pouted. "You needn't bring up the unpleasantness every time. I didn't like doing it."
"The 'unpleasantness' is rather the point as far as I'm concerned. But still. Those aren't the same things at all. We didn't use sorcery to compel my aunt's will; we simply didn't see eye to eye anymore, and she preferred to leave instead of fighting all the time."
"Yes, because she knew we had gained the backing of most of the city. It does you no favors to downplay the effort that went into her peaceful departure and your rise to power."
"I didn't like ruling the city without her help. If it hadn't been necessary--" He realized what he was saying and abruptly cut himself off.
"Exactly! And the necessary things I did were for a purpose that would have been better for you in the end. You were always more willing to go along when I presented you with a done deal. You'd have understood when you saw the results."
"Oh stars. Oh Valar." He'd gone along with it at the time, all the politicking and secretive deals that Annatar insisted would strengthen their position, not looking at it too hard until the coup was complete. And then... he hadn't wanted to consider it more. There'd been a city to run. "What was I thinking? That's not what I believe in. Not at all. I owe Aunt Galadriel a huge apology."
"Not what you should be taking from this, Tyelpë."
"No, I...ah, shit. I was such an asshole to her. That wasn't acceptable. I never should've--" Guiltily he recalled every time he'd passed by Lothlórien and talked himself out of stopping. "That's more than I should put in a letter, probably, but how am I supposed to see her and not let her notice anything of you? Maybe a letter would suffice for now..."
Sauron glared until he had Celebrimbor's full attention. "It is a terrible thing to be the one who loves more. To know that in the end, he must be the one to give up his principles if he would keep the one light in his life, because he is not loved enough to imagine the other would ever bend for him."
"I know very well what it is to see my beloved choose his principles over me, at the cost of my great pain. Do not dare pretend you have suffered in this more than I have."
Sauron only sighed.
"My hope has always been that you wouldn't be sacrificing your principles, but that you might come to see that you've taken the wrong ones, at least in how you believe you should carry them out, and that you might simply change your mind and agree with me."
"If only it were so easy."
"It could be."
"It could have been, from the first letter I wrote you after we'd both made our final rings."
It was Celebrimbor's turn to sigh, and he did so loudly.
"Did you come back from the dead only to continue our old arguments?"
"Maybe. Maybe I did. What of it?"
"I wish you could see that a better world was at our fingertips. That it might have been painful, but it was the right thing to do. And I wish I had taken any other approach to convince you of that. Why is that not good enough?”
"If ordering the world to your vision at any cost necessary was the right thing, then you could not have escaped killing me. I would never have accepted a world won by crushing the wills of others, as you forged your ring to do. One that required killing the people who opposed you. There was no approach that could have convinced me to go along with that. I would always have stood against it."
Annatar met his eyes. Finally he nodded. "I can believe that.”
"And killing me was an intolerable outcome.”
"As it turned out.”
"So then, if the outcome isn't right, doesn't that imply an error in the calculations that led to it? Perhaps even in the initial assumptions?”
Annatar was silent for a time. "Perhaps it means I am too weak to accept what is right. No one ever promised I would get to be happy in the end. Perhaps you are far stronger than me.”
"Perhaps the better world has happiness for many, instead of battlefields and torture chambers and miserable forced labor underground. Perhaps we could even be included in that number.”
"I'm not sure why you insist it would be so miserable after the transition. But I know what you're asking of me. You want me to accept a world where no one is following the same plan, where everything is half-assed by committee because nothing can be done without compromise, and compromise is giving up the possibility of perfection by its very nature. A world where everyone gets to have their inane little say and so nothing ever gets accomplished.”
"You managed well enough in my city.”
"I tolerated your city because you were in it.”
"Can you not tolerate an imperfect world then, one that I can live in?"
Sauron turned his back, and Celebrimbor thought he was dismissed, but after a moment he spoke again. "It is a terrible thing to be the one who loves more, Celebrimbor. You ask me to give up everything I have ever stood for. You ask the impossible."
"Me, or the world. I know. I only hoped it might be me."
"Do you think I did not share the same hope? No. I wanted to give you the world and myself. You rejected them."
"I came here and risked putting my life once more in your hands, after how dismally you wrecked it before, because of how I wanted you."
"You wanted me, sure. Just not all the parts you can't stomach. The parts you expected me to cut away."
"That's not fair."
"Isn't it?"
*
Celebrimbor paced the halls a while, steadfastly ignoring the dizziness that never quite went away. He could focus on nothing. Sauron's final words haunted him; the stalemate between them seemed immovable; and the thought of what he'd done to Galadriel, of Sauron's own justifications coming out of his mouth, made him feel sick. How much else had he allowed Sauron to lead him into that he never should have touched? What was he doing now, entertaining these conversations? What would Finrod, who'd been so kind to him before and after his death, think of him consorting with his murderer as if it none of it even mattered? What of all their friends in Eregion who had died defending the city? Did they not matter either? That Sauron refused to acknowledge how deeply he'd compromised himself already for his sake was infuriating.
Galadriel at least he could still address. He fetched a pen and the little book he carried for making notes and sketches, but nowhere could he settle and write. He ended up back in Sauron's bedchamber, drawn inexorably to the man he'd only imagined he knew. Why his mind couldn't fully comprehend that, he didn't understand. He'd have thought the torture would have made that clear, but if he'd been able to keep pleading for Annatar in the midst of it, the fading aftermath wasn't going to save him.
Sauron had slipped back into slumber, and Celebrimbor quietly took his seat beside him. He tried once more to find words for Galadriel that would be somewhat worth hearing. It couldn't wait; he'd forget about it or convince himself it wasn't really that important, everything else considered, but it was. He'd have to send it whenever he returned to Rivendell, but at least it would be ready.
Sauron's breath had gone from slow to shallow and hitching as he slept, and at a tiny groan, Celebrimbor glanced up to see him watching.
"What are you writing there?" His voice was forcibly light as if it could hide how bad he felt.
"My apology to Galadriel for forcing her out, like I said."
"Don't you think you've made your point?"
"Not everything is about you."
Sauron turned his face away.
"Are you in pain?"
For a moment, Celebrimbor thought he wouldn't answer. "I need my ring," he said at last. "This could all just go away."
"That's a yes, then. Can I bring you anything for it?"
When Sauron looked back, his face was somber and drawn. "Wouldn't you rather watch me suffer?"
"No. Absolutely not."
"Then why are you still here, Celebrimbor?"
Celebrimbor held his gaze, and for long they stared at each other unmoving. "Because some foolish part of me that's going to get me killed again still cares about you too much for anything else. Now, is there anything you can take for pain, or not?"
He closed his eyes and waved a hand. "Ask Muzgâsh. And shut the curtains, please."
When Celebrimbor returned with a vile-smelling brew in hand, he heard a voice within. He paused, uncertain if he should interrupt the one-sided conversation. He caught something about long-ago promises, and before he could hear things about Sauron's ancient lord that he didn't want to know, he knocked and entered, bracing himself on the doorframe while the world wobbled.
"I'm fine," he insisted at Sauron's concerned look. Celebrimbor closed the door quietly and offered him the medicine.
"Should I leave you to rest a while?"
Sauron swallowed the drink with a grimace, shaking his head minutely. "Would you just sit with me until my head stops hurting so much? If it isn't too much to ask?"
Celebrimbor thought of how often such simple comforts had been denied him in those last days, and he shuddered. He had no desire to inflict the same, however much it was deserved. "All right. I'll be right here." He pulled the chair Naglur had loaned him from the barracks closer, careful not to bang or scrape it against the floor.
Sauron reached out just enough to brush his fingertips over Celebrimbor's knee, a confirmation he was solid and real, and shifted into a more comfortable position. Celebrimbor flipped to a fresh page of his book and spent some time recording the scene before him: Sauron, resting on the pillows, changed in the course of illness and deaths and whatever it was he'd done to himself in making his Ring, but still recognizable as Annatar. He wondered how different he looked from his time as Morgoth's lieutenant--surely he had looked different, or someone would have recognized him. Why then had he kept this form instead of returning to the old one? His pen had captured a gentleness in his sleeping face, and Celebrimbor couldn't tell if it was there in the model or not.
*
"Would you tell me about Morgoth?" Celebrimbor asked later that evening. He couldn't bear to keep revisiting the impassable roadblock between them, but he didn't know how to stop himself from coming back and worrying at the wound where the love they'd shared had been.
Sauron eyed him warily. "What do you want to know?"
"What was he to you?"
"He was... my everything." He turned his head away. "I adored him in every way possible, and...he loved me, in his own harsh way. But he's gone, and...I don't know. I'm not sure what you're looking for. He probably wouldn't approve everything I've done since. I'm not sure I'd want him to."
Celebrimbor reached for his hand, and Sauron glanced back in surprise. "I just thought... it's a huge part of your life I know so little about. I'd like to know." Was it wrong to feel compassion for the loss of the one who'd destroyed his family? It wasn't the same as wishing him back, he told himself, to regret the pain of someone he'd loved.
"About all the things that make me a monster in your eyes? Forgive me if I have my doubts."
Celebrimbor considered this and decided to ignore it for the time being. "Do you miss him?"
Sauron laughed, a terrible, bitter sound. "Yes. A little less desperately while I had you. And I felt guilty about it through every moment I was happy."
"Surely he would want you to be happy."
"Maybe."
"I wish I'd known then."
"No you don't. You'd have kicked me right out of your fair city or had me executed. Unless that's what you meant."
"I hope I wouldn't have. I'd like to think I'd have given you the same chance to start fresh that I gave everyone else."
"I don't believe you could."
Celebrimbor didn't back down. "I'd like to think I could've comforted you when you were grieving for him."
"Please leave," Sauron whispered. "Just for now."
Celebrimbor's heart twisted, thinking he'd finally crossed a line, but Sauron squeezed his hand.
"I'm not angry. I want to be alone."
Celebrimbor nodded and rose. He wasn't quite out of the room when he heard muffled tears. He gave no sign he'd noticed and didn't turn back.
He ought to leave now altogether. He ought to go make his report to Elrond and whatever wizard was around to hear. Then an attack would be planned and brought against Sauron, right away, while he was too weak even to sit up for long, and Celebrimbor shouldn't feel so awful at that thought--how much terrible damage would war with him cost later, when he was stronger? Hadn't he said again and again that he would not turn his course? Then why couldn't Celebrimbor stomach the idea of parting from him, much less betraying him to his doom?
He shouldn't have come. Any sign of gentleness from Sauron, even if it were only to hurt him more later, was always going to stir these feelings. He should have known better. He found himself wondering if Sauron had actually liked the spiced honey cakes they used to share, and if he could figure out how to recreate them, and cursed his own weakness. Any such little offering would likely be read as capitulation, or at least vulnerability, and he decided he didn't care; it was wearing at him to see Sauron so despondent day after day, and if there was anything he could do to grant a moment of the joy they'd once known, he wanted to give it. He might as well abandon himself for lost.
*
Celebrimbor woke groggily, blinking his eyes open as if through a thick haze. His mouth was uncomfortably dry, and a headache was throbbing behind his left temple. And at the back of his skull. When he tried to sit up, the world shifted strangely.
"Don't do that." Sauron was sitting at his bedside, looking like he could barely remain upright himself. His body was swaying from the effort. "For once in your life just be still."
The reversal of their usual positions was unnerving. Very carefully Celebrimbor lowered himself back onto his pillows and tried to recall what he'd been doing last. "What happened?" His voice croaked. "Actually, can I have some water first?"
It was Sauron he was asking. Time slipped, and he expected chains around his wrists, and--
"I'm getting it. I'm giving you water. Don't you dare."
His chest hurt too much to be breathing so fast, and surely that was because--because--He felt the dungeon Sauron had made of his cellars all around him, but then water was at his lips, cool and clean, and the pillows were soft behind him, and that didn't fit at all, and when he looked up into Sauron's face--
"You're not well enough for this. Lay down with me before you collapse." Celebrimbor closed his eyes so he wouldn't have to see the terrible mix of fear and love in his torturer's gaze.
Sauron gritted his teeth. "Like you won't panic that much harder."
"I'm fine. You're going to make yourself sicker." He managed to shift over a little, and cursing quietly Sauron climbed into bed beside him. It took long minutes for the Úmaia's breath to even out and his heart to slow, and Celebrimbor wondered how many years of painstaking recovery he was throwing away for Celebrimbor's sake. Focusing on Sauron's troubles gave him an easier time convincing his own body it didn't need to make such a fuss.
Long before Celebrimbor thought he should be moving again, Sauron reached for a teapot, kept warm on a stand above a candle, and poured a cup, sloshing it a little as his hand shook.
"Here. I have something else for you. Now that you're awake and calm."
"You've really got to stop that and lie still."
"I know," he murmured. "I will after this."
Celebrimbor took the cup and sipped the steaming liquid. The sharp fragrance hit him and brought with it all the comfort and excitement of a home he had built to fit him, where he had belonged, created, loved and been loved. "Holly tea," he whispered, holding back threatening tears. It was prepared exactly the way he liked best, that no one in Rivendell had been able to match. "Where did you get that?"
"I sent someone under the mountains to Eregion the day you arrived. They don't grow on this side. Not around here."
He sipped again, trying to hold on to the fleeting feeling of everything right with the world. "Are...are you trying to buy my affection with gifts?"
"No. If only because I don't expect it would work. But I would like to make you comfortable, if I may."
"Ah. Well. Thank you. I suppose." He returned to his tea, more aware than ever of Sauron's intent focus on him. "I take it I passed out again," he remarked at last.
"One of the cooks found you collapsed in the kitchen. What in Arda were you up to at that hour?"
"Oh." The honey cakes. He had wanted to be the one giving gifts of long ago. "I couldn't sleep. There was something I wanted to bake."
"You're going to run yourself back into the grave at this rate." Sauron seemed deathly serious, and Celebrimbor wasn't sure what to make of it.
"I know it looks bad, but it's just a fainting spell. Nothing to worry about."
"You were running a high fever. Muzgâsh has been working night and day to bring it down. I've watched elves fade and die who were less ill than you've been the last few days."
"Days?" It did explain how he felt. His body hadn't done that since those first few weeks out of Mandos, when everyone had speculated it really was too soon, and that he might not be able to remain among the living. "And you?" Celebrimbor asked lowly. "You've been here watching over me all this time?"
Sauron didn't answer. He dampened his lips, took a careful breath. "I truly am sorry." It was quiet but painfully clear.
So they were actually doing this. For all that he'd demanded it, Celebrimbor was no longer certain he could bear it, and everything he supposed should come after. It would change them once more, and he didn't know what he wanted to be. What he wanted Annatar to be.
"I can't face losing you again. Losing you the first time killed me."
"No," Celebrimbor corrected wearily. "It killed me." One-upping each other in pedantry had been a gleeful, merciless sport once. Celebrimbor found no joy in it now.
Sauron took it steadily, without flinching or indignation. "Yes. I killed you. And nothing that came after was ever worth it. And I wish I had realized that--accepted it--before I'd done any of it." He paused, waiting for something, but Celebrimbor had nothing to say.
"You win. You called my bluff. I'll withdraw all troops to Mordor--if you'll allow me to maintain that much? I'll sign whatever treaties you want. I suppose that's why they sent you. Angmar will be more difficult; the Nazgûl don't entirely listen to me when I've so little strength and no Ring to enforce it, but I'll do what I can. Whatever of me stands between you and the world you want to live in, I will clear it away."
It didn't feel right. It didn't feel like how it ought to go. "You're only saying that because you're afraid I'll die if you don't."
Sauron was silent a long moment. "I don't mean it any less. What shall I swear upon? The stones of Eregion? Lord Melkor himself? I will swear upon your name, Celebrimbor, and it will bind me as fast."
"You know that I ask and accept no oaths," Celebrimbor answered faintly.
"You might have changed your mind in the last three thousand years."
"I haven't."
Sauron nodded slowly, eyes downcast. "I don't have any expectation you'll actually want me in your life again. I understand. All I need is to know that you're happy and safe and that I'm doing what pleases you. That's the only thing that matters to me if you're alive. If you'd write, once in a while, just to confirm those things, it's all I ask, but I don't even demand that. You don't have to stay here where you're putting your health in jeopardy any longer. I don't want you to. I want you to go where you'll be well and forget about me if that's what it takes. I--"
Celebrimbor put a finger to his lips. This close--too close--he could see strands of grey in the lifeless rose-gold hair and tiny red veins in puffy golden eyes that had probably wept off and on for hours before he woke. "You've been listening to the other Celebrimbor again."
Sauron didn't speak until Celebrimbor moved his finger, and that small deference made him want to scream. What good could it do now? Where had it been when he'd needed it so desperately? "I've had no one but him to listen to for years."
"He tells you I hate you."
"Don't you?"
"I don't know. But I do know I want you to listen to me and let me speak for myself instead of always believing him."
"I'll try."
"I missed you. When you left Eregion." That much at least he could say; it had been at the forefront of his mind when everything else was too painful. "More terribly still when I realized the you who left would not be coming back."
"And after?" The small voice made his heart ache.
"After, I missed you enough to return from the dead inadvisedly early and come all the way back to Middle-earth to see if Annatar could still be found."
Sauron scoffed. "That name was a lie."
"Is there another you'd rather be called?"
"No."
"Then shut up about it. Annatar." Carefully he raised a hand, and with delicate fingertips traced the gaunt lines of Sauron's face: the starkly jutting cheekbones, the hollows that had once been smoothly round.
"I know I am not beautiful any more." He said it like that was his greatest shame out of everything they'd discussed, and Celebrimbor wanted to feel insulted, but he also heard the pain behind it.
"You're wrong. You were beautiful even when you were torturing me, and you're beautiful now." He had thought the cruelty he had suffered might have erased what he found lovely in Sauron's features, but that had never been the only thing he saw there, and the record death had written upon him did not obscure it either.
Gently, oh so gently, Sauron gathered up Celebrimbor's fingers in a grip so light he couldn't imagine feeling constrained, and brought them to his lips.
"I do not wish you to feel obligated to me in any way," he murmured, not quite releasing him but not holding on either. "If this moment is all there ever is again between us, I will count it a gift beyond measure and hold to everything I have promised you. I do not want you to offer anything because you believe you must to...protect your world from me." He said this with a bitter twist of his mouth that showed well enough how little he thought the world needed such protection, but he said it all the same. Celebrimbor wondered if that was enough. He decided it might be.
"You are my world," Celebrimbor sighed. "For better or for worse." He leaned across the inches separating their faces and kissed him.
Annatar froze, but when Celebrimbor did not relent, he relaxed into it and kissed him back. It was slow, gentle, each of them mindful of the other's ill health, and there was something so tender to it that Celebrimbor felt tears on his cheeks before they were through. Annatar brushed them away.
"I did not mean to make you cry."
"Out of all the tears I've shed because of you, these are the ones you object to?"
"I am sorry for all the others."
Celebrimbor moved closer so that he could tuck his head under Annatar's chin as they'd rested so often once. Very hesitantly, Annatar placed an arm around him.
"Is this all right?" Annatar asked.
"Yes. Please."
"I don't want to scare you. I don't want to make you cry."
"Just hold me." Weariness was catching up with him quickly, and there was nothing he wanted more in that moment than to stay as they were. "I don't want to be alone."
"Anything you need," Sauron whispered. It wasn't fair that sleep came so much easier in his embrace.
*
When Annatar stirred, Celebrimbor was already awake, watching him sleep and contemplating his choices. It was still hard to reconcile the reality of Sauron and all he had done with the Annatar he remembered. The thought of it made him feel vaguely sick, but he had no desire to take back anything he'd said. They could not go back and undo it, but he was still lying here beside him, and he couldn't get rid of the idea that there might yet be something new and better before them. It was a terrible thing, to hope, to let himself believe it wouldn't all be snatched back again and end in the pain he'd learned so well, but his stubborn heart kept doing it anyway. If that made him irredeemably selfish, so be it.
Annatar's eyes fluttered open and immediately narrowed at the light. He stared just past the foot of the bed, and his face fell. "I had hoped when I woke again, I might get to see you smile," he said in a small and tremulous voice.
"Here," Celebrimbor said and took his hand.
"Tyelpë." Annatar turned his head to him. "I shouldn't be here. I'll get out of your way."
"I'd rather you stayed, at least for breakfast. We can see about moving you back to your own room later if you'll be more comfortable. I think I'm feeling a lot better. I'll be up and about again."
"More carefully for a while, please."
Celebrimbor nodded and winced. His head was uncomfortably fuzzy still and throbbed when he moved. Maybe it would be longer than he thought.
Annatar glanced back at the foot of the bed and then at Celebrimbor with an intensity and anguish that had Celebrimbor opening his mouth to ask what was wrong.
"You can't hear him?"
"No," Celebrimbor said gently. "He's only there to you."
"Would you please--" He gripped Celebrimbor's hands tightly. "I know it isn't fair. Can you--hold me? Talk to me? He... he's screaming that I'm a liar and deceiver and I shouldn't be here so close to you, and--"
Celebrimbor pulled him closer.
"He isn't wrong, but I'm not lying to you now. Not since you've come back to me. I don't intend to."
Celebrimbor was inclined to believe him, despite the corner of his mind that kept reminding him it could all be an elaborate ruse. That didn't seem important just now. "I'm here. Don't think about that. It's for later. Other times. Do you want to know what I was up to in the kitchens?"
"I would very much like to know."
"I wanted to make you the spiced honey cakes we used to eat sitting on the balcony watching the stars. We had some of the best conversations out there."
Annatar looked stricken. "You always had the bakers put in extra ginger for me because I liked them hot. You took such care in even the littlest things. You...used to touch me so softly. Like I was something precious." His voice fell to a whisper. "I loved how you touched me."
There was something appealing in how lost he seemed, in the vulnerability so readily given into his hands. He liked that it hurt Annatar to remember, and as soon as he realized what he was feeling, that Annatar had been right in that, he tried to shut it down, then decided he didn't care. He could use the past to hurt him more; Annatar would let him, and they both knew it. He traced Annatar's cheek and trailed his fingers down his throat, careful to avoid the separating skin that wept black blood like an orc's. He could hurt him, but he wouldn't. The knowledge of that power was enough.
"I could touch you softly still."
Annatar's breath hitched and became almost a whine. "I want to learn anew how to touch you softly in turn." He murmured the words like a prayer, hushed and reverent. "If you would allow such a thing."
It was all he'd wanted since--since what didn't bear thinking of. "Touch me, then."
Annatar's hands slipped under his shirt as Celebrimbor combed his fingers through his hair and pressed soft kisses along his jaw. It felt simple, good. He hadn't been sure it would.
"Wait," Annatar gasped against his lips.
"What is it?"
"It's... silly, I know. I know he isn't...here. But I can't do this with him watching."
Celebrimbor wrapped a strand of hair around his finger. The grey in it might shine like silver in better circumstances, he thought. "Isn't he just...a version of me? It's like having me in two places at once."
Annatar shook his head. "I don't want to glance up and see how much he disapproves. Later? He doesn't usually stick around all day."
"Of course." Kissing his forehead, he gave Annatar a bit more room.
A knock came at the door, and Muzgâsh entered with a large tray. She paused, seeing how they were wrapped around each other, but at Annatar's gesture she hurried over.
"Good timing," Celebrimbor murmured under his breath. Annatar's lips quirked in half a smile.
"You seem a good sight more alive than last I was here," she commented to Celebrimbor, leaning over Annatar to check his temperature and pulse.
"I think I must be. Thank you. I'm told you've a done a lot of looking after me."
"Whenever Lord Mairon would get out of the way and let me do my job."
Celebrimbor glanced at Annatar with interest. He scowled and said nothing.
"How's your head?" Muzgâsh asked him as she released his wrist.
"It hurts when I move much," he admitted.
"If you elves work anything like orcs, you can start getting up and doing more--gently--as soon as that stops. And as long as you don't take any more chances with those dizzy spells. It won't do you any good to fall and hit it again."
"I'll be very careful not to put you through this a second time."
"It's him you should be worried about putting through things, not me."
"I don't need the commentary, thank you," Annatar told her.
"Of course, my lord." She passed him and Celebrimbor their breakfasts and more of the holly tea. "Anything else while I'm here?"
"I'm expecting envoys from one of the mountain tribes sometime this week. Inform me immediately when they arrive, even if you have to wake me."
"Understood." She bowed and left them to their meal.
Annatar sighed. "I'll need to renegotiate alliances with the goblin tribes. Most of them are based on allocations of potential loot. Ceasing all raids won't be a welcome policy change."
"Will that be a problem?"
"Not if I'm clever about handling it. And I like to think I can still be clever." He gave Celebrimbor a wry grin.
"Thank you," Celebrimbor said quietly. "It does mean a lot."
Annatar dropped his gaze. "I can't change how I went about things before. But...I hope it's something. You're welcome to sit in on discussions. I won't hide anything."
"I'll take you up on that."
They both focused on their food then. There was creamy porridge with apple and raisins, and fresh bread and butter. For once, eating didn't feel so much like a chore.
"So. Mairon, is it?" Celebrimbor asked as he took another sip of tea. "Or is that only to your servants?"
Annatar took a long time to answer. "It's... my name. Melkor called me that, or Thû. It's what I use among my people. I just...it feels bad to ask you to call me Admirable. If you can't really mean it. And I don't see how you can. So I didn't want you to know. It would feel like mockery in your voice."
"I won't use it if you don't want me to. But I'm glad to know it."
*
Annatar fell asleep again from sheer exhaustion, without finishing his breakfast. Celebrimbor set it out of the way and curled up beside him. The day passed in a slow, syrupy way, napping pressed against each other and waking to map each other's faces as if neither could quite believe they were both there in a shared embrace. Every time Celebrimbor closed his eyes, he recounted Annatar's words again. They were starting to feel like they might be real, and he thought that should scare him more than it did. Annatar slept clutching Celebrimbor's hand to his chest, and Celebrimbor let him.
Morning came, and Celebrimbor's head felt clearer and less like he was being stabbed if he moved too fast. He thought the mildew had reclaimed a smaller extent of the walls than he'd expected in the days since he'd scrubbed them last. Maybe it could be beaten back. Part of him wanted to find out.
"I will have to go back sooner than I would like," he told Annatar as he filled their cups from the teapot Muzgâsh had brought up. "If I don't, they'll send someone to look for me. Probably Glorfindel.”
Annatar grimaced.
"I know," Celebrimbor smiled. "Eventually we will have to write up those treaties, but...I don't think they should see you like this.”
"Weak, you mean.”
Celebrimbor nodded slowly. "I'm not sure what they'll do. I think I can convince them, but...anyway, you shouldn't be traveling. I thought I'd go back, report there's nothing here but a lesser Ringwraith and a few stray orcs, and tell them I'm headed East for a while. Then we'll be undisturbed, for a little while at least."
"And... you'll really come back here? To me?"
"I will," Celebrimbor breathed, then he said it again louder. "I want to be where you are. And that should give us a few years' reprieve to prepare. For you to recover a little more.”
"For me to find my Ring.”
"About that." Celebrimbor drew a deep, shaky breath and plunged ahead. "It's too dangerous. That's more power than any individual should hold. Not you, not anyone. The Ring should not exist. It has to be destroyed.”
Anger flashed across Annatar's features, and Celebrimbor quailed, certain of impending pain, but Annatar took his time responding. "You don't understand, Tyelpë. The Ring is not some separate object. Part of my eäla exists within it. It is a part of my body. The Ring is me. Destroy it, and you destroy me in a way that will be much harder to come back from." He paused, thinking. "I will give the Ring into your keeping. When it is yours, willingly given and fully wielded, I will have no power to take it back from you or deny you.”
Celebrimbor stared at him, moved and repulsed by the thought at the same time. "I should not have such power either. Not over the world, and not over you.”
Annatar's expression went cold and resigned, and he looked at him as if all light and joy had fled the world. "Do you require my death, Celebrimbor?”
"No! No, that isn't what I meant nor what I want. Not at all.”
"It is what you demand if you must have my Ring destroyed, whether you mean to or not. I will withhold nothing from you, but I am feeling misled after the last few days. I would rather not--”
Celebrimbor struggled to pull his wits together. "Surely there must be some way to undo it. To take it apart, unwind your spirit without hurting you.”
"I don't think it can be reversed. It's...more like dispersing heat than alloying a metal.”
So they were at a standoff again. Celebrimbor wondered how long it would take for any obstacle to stop making them feel like one or the other must die. Or if it was somehow written into the Song from the beginning, and their happiness had been forbidden from before Time.
"I think...I might be able to...alter it, though," Annatar offered. "If we could change it to break its dominion over the other rings...that might end their power entirely, even the ones you made, but...and if it no longer magnified my power, but only contained it... then...?”
"I think that would suffice," Celebrimbor said quietly.
"Everything would have to be absolutely correct on the first try. Any mistake, and--" He caught his breath, looking more frightened than Celebrimbor had seen him in a long time.
"You're putting your life in my hands. I understand.”
"In your...”
"I'm going to help you. I'm going to check and recheck every calculation and I'll be with you at every step.”
His shoulders sagged in relief. "Far better yours than mine. Together there is little we might not accomplish." He offered Celebrimbor a hesitant, crooked smile. "For a very long time I've wished I could share the whole process and talk it over with you.”
"I'm very interested in how it works when it's not--I'm not--" He took a few breaths in quick succession, too quickly, not sure whether it was tears or panic he hung on the edge of and not wanting it either way. Sauron had worn it, had tried to batter down the walls of his mind with it the whole time he'd been tortured.
"I know." Annatar took his hands, and the more distant part of his mind thought that should have made things worse, but the rest of him clung on with everything he had. "I won't pursue any world-changing projects again without consulting you first," Annatar promised. "I won't endanger what we have.”
It was everything he wanted to hear, but not enough to halt his thoughts. He kept picturing the gold glint on hands cutting him open, instilling pain as only the greatest expert could. "I think I'm going to throw up," he announced.
When he came back to bed, still shaky, Annatar offered his arms hesitantly, and Celebrimbor curled into his embrace. He gently stroked Celebrimbor's hair. "Tell me if I'm making things worse, won't you?"
Celebrimbor nodded.
*
Celebrimbor didn't trust his body to carry him outside or even downstairs to the kitchens, but he went out and walked the halls to clear his head, one hand always near the wall to catch him. He had to move slowly still, but he thought he felt steadier than he had of late, and the dizziness only troubled him once, when he'd sat down to rest a moment and stood back up. Or maybe it was only that paying attention and taking the care he needed had started to seem worthwhile. He had more appetite too, and that was a quiet surprise. Food hadn't tasted like much in his new life, even though it was more normal for a newly embodied Elda to find flavors overwhelming at first, and anyway that should have long since worn off. He came back and took an apple from the table and sliced into it, noticing with every bite the crisp sweetness in a way that hadn't registered before.
Annatar was scribbling something on a sheaf of parchment. A small slate sat beside him, covered with notes in his elegant, fine hand.
"What are you working on?"
Annatar glanced up and smiled wryly. "Keeping my promises. Here. Most of this is for you. I haven't gotten as far as serious ideas, but these were the formulas that went into the Ring. I'm considering adding a negation to the inscription, or whether setting a gem in it might be enough to disrupt the power loops, but there's risk too, and the Ring itself will resist any changes..."
Celebrimbor took the proffered pages and settled in beside him. "Do you suppose this will be enough to keep us busy for the next hundred years?"
"It won't make much difference if we haven't found it by then."
"Oh, that's a whole other problem. We'll worry about that later."
Annatar bit his lip. "I hope I can spend the next hundred thousand years making things and solving problems with you," he said quietly. He raised his hand without a finger to cradle Celebrimbor's cheek, and Celebrimbor leaned into the touch. "I'm so glad you came to find me. Nothing else matters to me like that does. I never would have dared to hope."
"Annatar..."
"I still don't understand why. You couldn't have believed it would be like this."
Celebrimbor looked into his eyes and spoke the truth he had locked away. "Because I love you. Enough to risk dying twice."
Annatar shuddered. Before he could sink too far, Celebrimbor slipped a hand behind his neck and gently pulled him into a kiss. For as long as they were lost in each other, everything else fell away. Perhaps they were changed beyond redress, Celebrimbor thought. Perhaps more had been damaged than could ever be repaired. But for the first time since he'd heard Sauron's voice chanting those wretched words of power to forge his ring so long ago, he finally felt alive.