The Unexpected | LotR Fanfiction

Epilogue part 1: Dusk Falling

A pair of booted feet crunched on corpses as they walked across the battlefield. Those bloodied boots kicked aside the fallen, stepped on cold hands and legs, on discarded shields and weapons. Those boots splashed in puddles of blood, where the ground had been unable to absorb so much liquid. Gallons upon gallons had been spilt. Thousands upon thousands had fallen. So many dead; orcs, elves, men, and women. The halls of Mandos were indeed crowded.

Alagosson traveled across the vast field of the dead, searching. He may have had respect for the dead once, long ago he might have carefully tread around the bodies, but those days were long past. He just didn't care anymore.

So many flies flew low above the field that it appeared as if a fast-shifting storm cloud was hovering above the decaying bodies. The elf had walked across many battlefields filled with decomposing bodies in the past, for that was unavoidable if you were a warrior. And if you were simply Alagosson. Although in the past he had grown accustomed to breathing through his mouth so as to decrease the scent of rotting flesh, he had to wear a perfumed strip of maroon cloth over his mouth and nose. The orcs scurrying a respectful distance behind him only held a wadded-up piece of cloth

Anytime Alagosson caught one of those orcs moving closer to him, he killed it. He didn't offer an explanation, but the orcs could sense his hatred towards them. More so now that Sauron was gone. He didn't have to worry about suspicion being placed upon him now, so he simply let his animosity be known. And yet at other times, he felt a deep pity for the orcs. He didn't know why, but he did.

Alagosson grimaced as he passed a particularly gruesome body. The elf's throat had been ripped out, a deep cut running across the face and eyes. The stomach had several weeping gashes, each one seeping ruined entrails.

He immediately recognized it as Duvaineth's work.

A beauty, she was. But as much as she was beautiful, she was mentally insane. She worshipped him almost as if he were a god, which—at times—he couldn't complain about, but mostly it just felt wrong. He was just a simple elf victim to...

Alagosson instead focused his attention on the rubble of bodies he passed. A large circle had been made bare by a great force, each pebble had been cleared, leaving only hard-packed dust. Tiny lines streaked away from the vacuous spot of land, evidence of a blast. And around that blast area were hundreds of dead orcs. An empty spot surrounded by the dead.

Many of the ones closer to the empty plot had lackluster metal armor embedded in their corpses. Yet, that hadn't been the cause of their deaths.

When the ring had been cast into Orodruin—or what most of Middle-Earth calls it, Mount Doom—the vast majority of Sauron's life force had been destroyed. Therefore, Sauron's corporeal body had imploded—died—sending out such a shock wave that it killed a couple hundred of the orcs around him. The ring's death had not only brought about Sauron's but a large group of his servant as well. Of course, a few hundred were nothing compared to the orcs total population.

The ring did hold most of Sauron's soul. Yet, when Sauron gathered enough strength, he had been able to cast a speck of what was left of him into the prophecy-written. The insignificant amount of his soul was just enough to weaken her abilities. Yet, her immortality fled her and instead she accidentally received the ability to control Sauron's most important weapon. In a way, if one thought about it, Lumornel had been a second 'ring.'

But Lumornel had died. And the amount of Sauron's soul had been so small, compared to the amount made into the ring, it was too insignificant to matter to Sauron. After all, what was left of him right now was simply floating about right now, destroyed beyond repair. That small part residing in Lumornel's dead body was barely enough for Sauron to do anything with.