Everlasting Dawn

The Prologue

- This was originally started by my friend CrayzeeDayz and myself, and she has graciously agreed to let me continue the story.

"MAIRON STOP THIS MADNESS!"

That voice, he had not heard it for near enough an eternity. He couldn't believe it, he wouldn't believe he had heard it: her voice. But temptation thwarted him and he turned slowly round. Beneath his helmet he stared at her, he couldn't be seeing this, she couldn't be there; standing, but a few centimetres from him. Was she even real? Or was it just in his head, like the dreams that had plagued him for nearly eternity? Eriathwen looked at him, her emerald eyes were glistening with tears, but shame was also laced into her feeling. The tall, armoured figure edged forward too afraid to touch her in case she'd vanish before him.

"Dear one..."

Her voice was soft, and melted his heart. The wind caught her chestnut hair and the all-to-familiar scent of rosemary filled his senses. She was there, real flesh and blood. Every inch of her perfect beauty standing before him, standing in the blood-soaked battlefield. His voice cracked as he spoke, too filled with deep emotions that his cold heart could not convey.

"Eriathwen."

The woman met his gaze, it was harsh and cruel, but behind his eyes she could see the man she knew, the one she had loved; before Morgoth, before the lies. She took a step closer to him, not looking at the scattered remains of the five armies that had fought not hours before. Sauron lifted his metal-covered hand to stroke her cheek, but stopped curling his fingers into a fist, lowering his arm again. Eriathwen released a breath she had been holding.

"Why are you here?"

"Galadriel summoned me. She said that you were planning to kill Thorin Oakenshield and exploit Smaug's great power."

The name of the she-elf hit him bitterly. It was the elves that had taken her from him, had taken her so far away from him. Her gaze wavered against his and her delicate face was cracking with emotion.

"Mairon, you knew that this wasn't necessary. Yet you still marched armies of terrible creatures and I...you cannot see what you have become, my love."

His head jerked up at the sound of his former name, his helmet covering the fierceness from his eyes, but all the same she felt it and stepped back. Sauron couldn't bear her recoiling from him. He took a hesitant step to her and spoke with a soft voice, one that was rusted with lack of use.

"My darling, I am still the same man I was before you left...This..."

He gestured to the carnage about them.

"Was all for you, in your memory I fought."

Eriathwen looked up, only now realising how close they were.

"Then why do you hide?"

Looking at him, she raised her hands and placed them either side of the cold metal helmet. Gently she pulled it away from his shrouded face. His face was scarred, skeletal almost, his eyes blind and sunken in, dark ominous shadows around them. His lips were dry and wrinkled and his head held merely the remains of the memory of hair. He looked down, too ashamed to let her look at him directly.

"Don't look at me, I am hideous."

Eriathwen sighed, shaking her head. Her love had always admired perfection in everything, yet here he stood before her, broken and imperfect. She gently placed her palm tenderly on his cheek. Before all the observers, they watched amazed, as her touch rejuvenated Sauron. His eyes became young and a bright flaming orange, his face filled out until a proud Maiar of fine beauty stood before them, golden locks falling over his shoulders.