#haladriel fic

Her name rolls off his tongue, soft and deadly and just a hint of awe, as though the lord of deceit and lies hasn’t known he would find her here the entire time. And yet when their eyes meet, for just a second, it all falls away. The sickening sound of flesh tearing apart, the ring of metal on metal as the orcs clash swords and knives in their eagerness to bring down the creature they once called father, none of it matters when Sauron’s eyes lock on hers. 

Her true desires can’t hide from that stare. Curse him to the Void right along with his once-mentor, because no matter the name he’s taken or the face he’s worn, those eyes of his see her. See through the veneer of power and grace and the light the Valar couldn’t take from her. 

See to her dark and terrible desire for power. See her desires to be out from under the thumb of anyone but herself. The War of the Jewels ultimately cost her all four brothers, and still, Varda help her, Galadriel thirsts for a power both terrible and divine. 

And then Sauron tells the orcs to raze Eregion to the ground. 

Maybe it’s Varda answering her prayer, or maybe Galadriel’s hold on the light is stronger than she thought, but the connection severs at the reminder of the death and destruction Sauron will always stand at the center of. 

“All this was your design from the beginning.” 

His lips twist, something like a smirk. “Please, you think too much of me,” he drawls, almost as if he’s embarrassed she credits him with that kind of power. Another illusion. Another lie that he only continues by adding, “The road goes ever winding. Not even I see its paths.” 

And neither do you. 

He doesn’t say it. He doesn’t have to. 

Galadriel doesn’t need to see all the other roads or paths that stretch endlessly before her. Not when she can put steel in her hands and end this now. Sauron even does her the favor of dropping to his knees, his neck exposed. He isn’t Halbrand, the lost king, a man who saw her as no one else has ever quite managed. He’s a monster that will destroy Middle Earth if she doesn’t stop him. 

But it will never be that simple. 

Sauron blocks her strike easily with the cursed crown, holding her at bay from his knees with an ease that infuriates her. That’s what she tells herself, anyway, as his too-perceptive stare trails down her heaving chest and lands on the ring on her finger. She can ignore his demands, ignore the weight of the ring on her finger, but the silky softness of his lie that he doesn’t wish to harm her can’t be ignored. 

Especially not when he remains on his knees in front of her in a mockery of submission and murmurs, “It is even more beautiful than Celebrimbor led me to believe.” 

His eyes are on the ring, and he’s the furthest from Halbrand he possibly could be with his now-pale hair and serene beauty with its icy edge. Halbrand lacked the cold polish of this version of Sauron, who may be on his knees, but he’s still covered in armor. Armor decorated with serpents, a stylized rendering of his true nature stitched in vivid detail across his chest. 

Being on his knees before her doesn’t change that. Suddenly, Galadriel can’t even bear to look at him. 

Dropping her sword and backing away, she snaps, “Is it your wish to heal me?” Sarcasm and rage and frustration drip from every word. 

If he hears it, he ignores it. “I wish to heal…all Middle Earth,” he says with the same soft, mad note. The worst part is that some part of Sauron is still Halbrand, and when Galadriel looks into his eyes, she can see that he believes what he’s saying. Sauron believes that he’s the savior Middle Earth has been waiting for, the kind and benevolent ruler who will set all to rights. 

And for a moment, Galadriel’s heart stays her hand. They stare at each other, caught in the unforgiving tides of duty and fate and a cursed connection between them that she can’t shake rushing against each other. 

He is evil incarnate but he’s also a match for her power. A true equal. She felt it when they fought together, when he still wore the mask of Halbrand but couldn’t entirely hide the power lurking between. It drew her to him, even if she didn’t realize it until much later. And for that brief time they fought together, side by side, what a team they made. 

But they aren’t a team now. The moment passes, and then they’re unleashing themselves all over again. It shouldn’t feel good as his blade flashes in the full light. He might be toying with her, but he isn’t exactly holding back. If one of their blows connect, this will all be over. One wrong breath, one stumble, will decide if red or black blood paints the earth beneath their dancing feet. 

And yet even as she ducks and rolls, even as her shoulder begins to burn with the effort of swinging her sword over and over, she can’t deny that some horrible part of her is enjoying this. It’s a deadly dance now between them, one foot here, pivot, swing the sword, spin, but oh what a glory it is to dance with a partner who matches her in skill. 

Steel clashes again, and for just a second, she thinks she has him. But he’s too clever to be caught so easily, twisting gracefully and locking their blades together with the cursed crown. 

“Galadriel,” Sauron purrs, her name silk on his tongue as his eyes once again settle so intently on hers, “Surely you of all the elves understand that to find the light, we must first touch the darkness.” 

There’s a beat before he moves again. A beat where flashes of images overtake her thoughts. Varda can’t save her from the fact that Galadriel has thought far too often about touching his particular brand of darkness. Of having it touch back, not with the oily stain of evil but with the power and molten fire that couldn’t be extinguished even when Sauron attempted to smother it under the guise of Halbrand. 

And then Sauron presses his attack all over again, driving her back, back, back, until she’s pressed between him and the stone at her back. His blade is terribly close to her throat, and that should be her focus, but his left thigh is between hers. When he presses closer, a taunting smirk curling his brutal and beautiful mouth, the increased pressure at the apex of her thighs is unquestionably intentional. 

Galadriel sucks in a breath and gathers herself as best she can, struggling against his strength. With every move they make, every shift of their weight as they grapple for control, his thigh presses into her. Layers of clothes can’t hide the flex of muscle, the heat of him—or how good it feels to be pinned down by him like this. 

Some part of her likes being at his mercy. Likes the push of the darkness against her light. Likes that his power and hers may be opposite sides of a coin but it’s the same coin. 

“We are not alike,” she makes herself spit out. The desires of her body are not relevant here. Not with what’s at stake. “We never were. It was just another of your illusions.” 

She needs to believe that. Needs to believe that nothing of what she’s felt for him, her greatest enemy, is anything but a lie—and he knows it. 

“Not all of it,” he says with the softness of a lover. With that same absolute conviction that proves he believes his own words. 

It takes all her strength of mind and body to lash back out at him. Her kick lands, sending him tumbling down the ruins. This is her opportunity, Galadriel tells herself as she drops gracefully down at his side. This is her chance to run him through and end this. 

But when he rises, he’s no longer coldly beautiful Sauron, but Halbrand. Soft curls frame his face, his armor fits for a prince, for a moment, he could be Tulkas. Beautiful and noble, the most noble warrior of the Valar. A perfect match for Galadriel and her power and her light. Someone she could actually have without betraying the very core of her being. Without betraying her people, all the people of Middle Earth. 

She’s not stupid. She knows this is yet another manipulation, but she still can’t lift her sword. Not until he goes too far, all but whispering, “Fighting at your side, I felt, if I could just hold onto that feeling…” 

Those heartfelt words and heavy-lidded eyes are enough to remind her of her purpose. She swings with all her strength, but only connects with stone. 

Halbrand vanishes and her own face stares down at her. Sauron is too vain to match her perfectly, the mirror gazing back a perfectly polished version of herself, not a hair out of place, as he says with her voice, “They could no longer distinguish me from the evil I was fighting.” 

She knows he chose her face for those words for a reason. That he chose to make himself a living, breathing mirror so she would understand he’s still saying the same thing. Still insisting that beneath their separate allegiances to light and shadow, they remain the same. 

And so she fights herself, fully conscious that Sauron chose this path intentionally. That he’s seen into her mind, seen the battles she waged with herself over her desires for power and the pull of the light. That he’s making her cross blades with herself now in the ultimate mockery of the battle that has long raged in the privacy of her mind. 

Only for him to sharpen the blade by transforming into Celebrimbor, mockery spilling from the lips of the great elven lord she’s long respected and cherished. 

As she crashes into the ground below, Galadriel knows she’s brought this on herself. Knows that some part of her, even now, is holding back her power. Is revolting against the idea that her hand will be the one to end him, even as she crawls and drags herself through the dirt just for him to kick her sword away. 

No longer her cruel mirror or her beloved Celebrimbor, he’s reclaimed the icy cold visage he seems to prefer. Another mockery of her light, the shade of his hair a near perfect match for hers. 

“I know your mind,” he tells her simply, an obvious fact. “The door is still open.” 

Because you’ve left it open for me, his taunting eyes scream. Because you can’t bear the thought of keeping me out even though you know duty demands it. Because we’re the same, you and I, ruled by our own desires above all else.  

“The door is shut!” Galadriel snarls, a vow to herself as much as it is to him. She knows what must be done. To her greatest shame, it will break some part of her heart, but personal costs have no place in this battle. She can’t be selfish about this. There’s too much at stake, for her people, for Middle Earth. Sauron might see himself as a benevolent dictator, the one who will heal the fractures, but his specific brand of medicine is little more than cruelty and power wrapped in a deceptively pretty package. 

All of which couldn’t be more clear when he pins her once against, except this time, she has no escape. His eyes never leaving hers, Sauron pushes a spike of Morgoth’s crown into her chest. Pain explodes, the cursed iron so deeply entrenched in shadow that her inner light can only shriek and howl her rage at the invasion. 

And still, there’s a beauty in the horror. Sauron has been stabbed with this very blade. His blood and hers, now forever entwined in the tiniest crevices and cracks in the ancient iron. 

“I would have placed a crown upon your head. I’d never have rested until all Middle Earth had been brought to its knees to worship the light of its queen,” Sauron tells her in that same exquisitely soft voice. As though he regrets the pain he’s inflicting even as he shoves the cold iron in deeper. 

The worst part is, he means it. Somewhere in the twisted corner of his mind, in his own way, he means it. He wants her at his side, but Galadriel knows he would never make her a true queen. He may speak of worship, of her light, but it would always be on his terms. Just like the rings, she would be a pretty ornament he would ultimately control. Her light included. 

And despite that, despite knowing she wouldn’t be a dark and terrible queen but a prisoner in an obsidian cage, some tired part of her yearns for it. She’s so tired of the bloodshed and the fighting and the strategy and the lives she’s responsible for. How nice it could be to lay down her sword just once. Let someone else fight the hard fight. 

Maybe Galadriel wouldn’t mind being his pretty jewel without a thought in her head. 

But that’s not a fantasy she has the luxury of entertaining. 

“The free peoples of Middle Earth will always resist you,” she snarls. I will always resist you. 

He hears the unspoken addition, and maybe there is a heart buried in the ashes that were once his soul, because she swears there’s a flash of hurt in his expression right before he yanks the crown from her flesh in one brutal jerk of her hand. 

Galadriel collapses, too stunned by the pain radiating through her veins to stop him as he scoops up the pouch containing the Nine. “The rings are mine,” he says, patient as a general before a field of green recruits. 

He’s about to say more but before the words emerge, a horn bellows from the smoking ruins of Eregion—a horn that can only be of dwarvish make. 

It’s only the flash of an idea, there and gone so quickly that Galadriel has to force herself not to keep thinking about it. Despite her insistence that the door is shut, she can still feel Sauron in her thoughts, slinking through the darkest corners. Swift as lightning, she makes a choice, drawing him away from her plans by letting him see the shameful secret he wants most. 

Galadriel loved Halbrand. Loved him enough that despite knowing who he was the entire time, despite seeing him now as he is, unapologetically selfish and ruthless and responsible for the massacre of much beloved Eregion, despite the wound clawing at her light that he inflicted, despite knowing that he’s Sauron and represents everything she’s devoted her life to fighting against…some part of him is still Halbrand. 

And curse her, she still loves that part. 

With nothing but a yawning void of air at her back, Galadriel doesn’t allow herself to think about what she’s about to do. Sauron needs to think he’s won for this to work. She lets his whispers into her mind, moving all the while as though she’s under his spell. 

She holds the ring out to him, one of the only three not corrupted by his power, a ring that is Celebrimbor’s triumph and pure light, and lets Sauron think he’s won. 

“You wish to heal Middle Earth,” she sighs in a soft, dreamy voice. Her eyes hold his, pain lancing through her even as her course becomes set. If only he could have remained Halbrand. If only they could have had a future. 

Just before his fingers close around the ring, Galadriel snaps her fingers closed, a tight fist she draws back into her chest as she straightens her spine and snarls, “Heal yourself!” 

Her weight pitches back over all that nothing. For a breath she’s weightless, suspended in that fraction of a breath before the plummet begins, before time shifts to seconds that drag out longer than her fall to the ground below. 

And then Sauron’s fist is in her bodice, fabric tearing as he yanks her back. Back onto the hard stone of the cliff, Morgoth’s crown still rolling away from where he dropped it with an all-mighty clang. Dropped it to save her, to save his precious ring, to continue to lord his power over her, to—

Kiss her. 

A mouth so cruel shouldn’t be so soft. 

Galadriel jerks against his hold. This is madness. A kiss swallows her protest, then another kiss, and she’s not exactly kissing him back, but somehow her free hand is on his shoulder. Not pushing him away, but digging in, her ragged and dirt-caked nails still sharp enough to form dents in the thick green leather armor. 

His teeth nip her lower lip, a sharp sting swiftly followed by the caress of his tongue. Galadriel’s eyes slip closed, dark, forbidden pleasure stoking long-dormant embers low in her belly. Beneath her fingers, thick leather softens to well-worn linen, ever so slightly damp, and she knows before she opens her eyes what he’s done. 

Halbrand stares back at her. Her Halbrand, in a simple shirt and trousers, dark hair messy and curling and ever-so-slightly damp. Cheeks dark with stubble, no longer pristinely and coldly smooth. He breathes out her name, reverent longing in his voice, pooling in his eyes, his long lashes sweeping his cheeks as he blinks slowly down at her. 

This time, when his mouth crashes into hers, Galadriel doesn’t even consider calling on the Valar for aid. And not because they would be so appalled by her actions that the last thing they would do is help her. No, she doesn’t bother calling on the light because in this moment, she knows that there is no light powerful enough to stop her from letting the dark in. 

She kisses him back. She knows he’s not Halbrand, knows it’s Sauron in a pretty mask he crafted just for her, but he tastes like her sensory memories of Halbrand, smells like him, feels like him. Salt and smoke cloud her judgment, the press of his hard chest against her as their dance resumes. Not blade and fury this time, but desperation and need propelling them until Galadriel finds herself, for the third or fourth or fifth time, with hard stone at her back and Halbrand—Sauron—crowding her from the front. 

Still wearing Halbrand’s face, he drops his sword and plunges his hand into her hair. He doesn’t say a word at first, his jaw hard and his eyes fixed intently on hers. They stare at each other, panting from the fight, the adrenaline, the sheer want that shouldn’t exist between them and yet still rages on no matter how many times their blades have sliced into it. 

“Let me give you what you desire, Galadriel,” he murmurs low against her ear. His breath is hot as he slides his tongue up to the sensitive point, the grip in her hair too tight to allow her to pull away. “You can tell yourself the door is shut, but we both know it doesn’t matter. Not when it’s me on the other side.” 

The ring is still clenched in her fist. The hard edges and dull bite of the stone against her palm should be a reminder of all the reasons why flinging herself off the cliff is the smarter choice, but even the lady of light isn’t spared from a desire to see what it is to walk through the darkness unafraid. 

For once in her long life, Galadriel hears the call of duty—and ignores it. 

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A (smutty) part 2 is in the works. While I originally planned to post all at once, migraine had other plans for today. I'm hoping to get the next part up soonish, and boy oh boy will I need a distraction this week, so I'm going to do my very best to stick to that!