Everything I did, I did it for you.

I remember those breathless days, dappled in gold, streaked with silver. Forges of crimson run thick with metal, flurries of cinders whip through the air like fireflies, caught in the radiance of the dawn.

I remember my craft, liquid alloys flowing through iron molds, glowing magenta, blushing vermilion. I remember the plumes of smoke, the soft hissing of heat doused in water, delicate tendrils of steam writhing slowly skyward. Bright metal melded under my hand; countless gemstones, facets glimmering bone-white and beautiful set within glistening coronas, shimmering rings. Amulets glint through the steam, traceries of woven metal that plunge and whorl, braided together like darting knives.

I remember my friends, the careless, drunken talk in the twilight halls, their laughter fluted, effortless. Now faceless with millennia, I still belonged with them, my comrades, my brothers.

But I remember the first time I saw you, my lord. Mountains cloven asunder in beauteous ruin, rivers withered, cracked in filigree drought before you. You leveled plains to silken dust, where carrion birds wheeled proud over empty eye sockets, over jaws that longed to snap and move and feed, the silent shrapnel of biological warfare. As you sang, the land belched forth its innards; coiling, curling, twisted entrails of molten rock spewed in obscene glory.

I stood aside, I watched you, your chaos exquisite.

I remember your passing, my lord. With every breath, I remember, some wild elemental allure, forbidden longing flamed into being.

I remember the shadows twisting around you, clots of night that wreathed and coiled like lust made flesh.

I remember the way you looked at me.

(You had lightning in your eyes)

It was the hardest thing I ever did. To leave my friends, my home behind. To turn my back on everything I had ever known, to be branded the traitor, spat on, forever cursed, forever outcast; my only crime that I loved you more, I loved you more than them and for my love I was damned.

It was the hardest thing I ever did.

But I did it for you, my lord.

And now I wander these ruined halls and I remember, where shattered marble lies jagged your laughter once echoed. Where those steps lie broken, your throne once sat, glimmering strands of wrought metal set ablaze by the sunrise. Where grand windows of polished glass refracted, refined the gloomy light into sprays of colour, dull voids remain, hollow archways flecked with tiny fragments of pane still rusted to their sockets. Their shadows crawl across the floor, warped and twisted. The wind whips through the lonely corridors, creaks through doors half-ripped off hinges, moans through gutted halls that long to ring with your laughter, burn with your fire.

(It's like they know they are dying)

But you were taken. By those cursed gods of malice. By their paralyzing light, the hunters bestial, celestial. Their divinity abhorrent. They broke your crown on the stones, sculpted iron rent, those blinding gemstones stolen, cuffs and collar forged from the dull, ruined metal.

In chains you were thrown before the enemy, and I could only watch.

Their touch wrenches ligaments from bone

Their light blisters skin, broiling in pale ecstasy.

Their laughter punctures muscle, mottles flesh in brutal harmony.

And you writhe and you scream and you scream, and I could do nothing.

I couldn't save you.

It's curled within, trapped down there in the dark, but it's deep and it's throbbing and it's clawing up through me, my weakness; that I should have stopped them, that I should have done something, anything to help you, to save you, but I couldn't, I couldn't face them so I stood aside, I left you, and I wish I could scream it, wish I could bleed it out all over these stones that I failed you, you trusted me and I failed you, and I...

(I think I saw you in my dreams.)

Everything was mute. Faded, colourless but you were there in hardblackredwhite ink standing cold and I ran to you and I grabbed you and I shook you but you couldn't hear me, you couldn't see me, you just stared into the milkwhiteblackvoid and I shook you harder, and I hit you, and still you did nothing. And I screamed, thickrawchoking and I sobbed and I pleaded hysterical, you had to come back please say something do something anything instead of this nothing, this blank where you should have been. And then I kissed you. Softly, I push my lips against yours so icypale so stiff, and I grab your jaw and force it open, force my tongue inside your mouth, sliding against your teeth and it tasted like metal.

And you shuddered (crumbled).

And I pulled myself back, surprisedscaredconfused, my hands gripping your shoulders.

My lips were red, dark and viscous clots sticking amongst the crimson.

And you moaned: low, keening, animal distress.

I stared at you and you cracked. Vermilion lines ripped across your face, your body, skin jagged and tight and tearing. Blood was dripping through my fingers, roses bloom visceral, stain your shirt, my hands, run down your arms.

I held you paralyzed, you suddenly limp in my arms and I didn't know, I didn't know what to do (leaking life across the stones) and you twisted and you writhed and you were whimpering (pleasepleasestop) and you were crying and you were gasping and I couldn't help you I couldn't do anything but hold you, hopingpraying that you would say something. You were clawing at your throat, that horridwrenchingbroken keening (stop it please please stop it I can't help you I don't know what to do) and you tore away from me, out of my arms and you whirled and faced me and opened your mouth and for a moment I was hopeful, for a moment I believed and

You spat blood at my feet.

(They had cut out your tongue)

And I shudder awake, heart thudding alive, (it's not real, it's not real, please don't let this be real) but you're still gone.

You're still lost somewhere out there where gods and demons play bloodstained games and I can never reach you.

I can never save you.

And I whisper it into the night; you trusted me, you trusted me and I failed.

And I loved you, I still love you, I would tear my heart out of my chest and hold it beating in my hands for you,

But you would still be gone.

((They will rip you apart and it will be because of me))

Written as a companion piece to 'The Lieutenant', because I couldn't quite justify it as another chapter to that story. Anyway, as always, I hope you enjoyed it. Reviews always appreciated, whether you loved it, hated it, or heard Tolkien roll over in his grave a little bit as you read it! xx