I'm going to come out and say it: Sauron is a needy bitch. We enjoy a period of relative quiet, and then he comes a-lurking, rattles the cage, and disappears again. Rinse and repeat. And thus it was the following year.
The aforementioned lurking had been transpiring over the last few centuries, so a resurgence of bad behaviour was not wholly unexpected. It was, however, unwelcome, because I was in the middle of a large research project on coping strategies at the time, and frankly, I was getting sick of Sauron essentially coming into my life and shitting in my bed at random intervals.
Nonetheless, that was our situation, and we simply had to get on with it, which in this case meant doing what we seemed to do best: calling another White Council meeting.
The Council members arrived in the coming weeks in a steady succession, Galadriel and Celeborn being the first to appear. To my intense surprise, Aiwendil the Usually Very Disorganised came next, and he arrived strangely bereft of any of his usual animals, with the exception of a skeleton staff of Rhosgobel rabbits pulling his sled.
"You travelled awfully light this time around, Aiwendil," I remarked to him casually over wine with him, Glorfindel, Elrond, Galadriel, and Celeborn that afternoon.
"Yes, it made for quite a lonely trip to Imladris, I must say," he replied with a small nod. "My birds are all in Isengard and the surrounds, being lent out to Curumo."
I raised an eyebrow and looked at the others.
"You still have no proof of your suspicions, Rhodri," Elrond reminded me, though he said it with much less conviction now than he had on previous occasions.
I scowled mistrustfully. "At this point, if he fortifies himself enough before I can prove it, it'll be too late," I grumbled, taking a sip of wine.
"Perhaps a compromise is in order, then," Celeborn offered. "We can watch him closely in this next Council. If he opts to delay further, we shall question him, and if he is for taking action, we will shelve our judgements awhile longer." He looked at me now. "What say you, Rhodri?"
"I think that's about the best we can hope for right now, but I want to add that you should still be very vigilant if he agrees to take action, because it could mean he has already prepared himself to do whatever it is he intends to. Who needs a whole army of birds like that? He has never taken an interest in being an effective leader of this Council before, and now he recruits everything in the sky without telling us?" I shook my head fervently. "I don't trust him."
Aiwendil looked incredibly surprised at all of this. "Curumo wouldn't do any of that, surely," he squeaked. "He was instructed to lead the Istari to unite Middle-Earth against Sauron."
"Even the Valar didn't always do as they were told, Aiwendil," I reminded him with a grave look.
"But you don't understand," he said. "I am a Maia. I cannot divine any badness in him."
"Manwë wasn't too brisk in picking up his brother's evil, either," I answered, shrugging.
Aiwendil leaned back in his seat, looking worried as he considered my last statement.
"Let us wait for the Council, then," Elrond acquiesced. "We will see what there is to be done then."
Círdan, Olórin, and Curumo arrived a couple of weeks later, and then we finally were able to sit down in earnest and begin discussions. Well, we would've, had we not squabbled like seagulls about who has what ring, who's hunting for this and that--rehashing the same insipid drama, as the White Council was wont to do.
"Even if we don't find the One Ring," Olórin said, standing up as the Council's bickering about the various Rings of Power finally snapped his last nerve, "We must at least take efforts to attack Sauron. He now has all of the 9 rings of the Men, and 3 of the 7 Dwarf rings. His power grows while ours wanes, and we must take action now while our strength permits, before he finds the One Ring himself. We must strike."
A-ha. Now we had finally reached the ultimatum.
"Hear, hear!" I called out in agreement.
A part of me wished that what happened next didn't, but as everybody knows, wishes are luxuries reserved for birthdays, and mine was still a few weeks away. The group looked to Curumo, possibly because they expected him to veto it and render the meeting as fruitless as he had all the previous ones.
Amazingly enough, though, he nodded his head once and said, "Perhaps you are right, Olórin."
Even Olórin could scarcely believe Curumo wasn't trying to brush away his insistence. I think he had been gearing himself up for another exhausting session of talking to a brick wall. Now, though, it appeared the wall had acquired ears and a bit of gumption.
Curumo stood up. "If what you say is true and Sauron indeed does gain strength, then we had best strike while we still might. In which case, we should prepare to invade Dol Guldur as soon as may be."
Elrond nodded and sighed. "Then we must start to ready troops and head southward before the Pass of Caradhras becomes snowed in for the winter," he said, now standing as well.
Curumo looked at him sharply. "No," he said. "This must be a stealth operation. We shall take a handful of us Council members and go straight to the core, bypassing the guards."
"But we have the resources to do this properly!" Glorfindel protested. "These forces will simply scatter and find a new master to lead them if we defeat Sauron!"
"They answer to him alone, Glorfindel of Gondolin," Curumo said in a patronising voice. "We have no need to fear them if anyone else tries to take Sauron's place."
"That's preposterous," I snapped. "We could be overwhelmed by sheer numbers as well if more of us opt to sail west, and you know that's the case!"
"To keep numbers as low as possible, the company to Dol Guldur will consist of me, Olórin, Aiwendil, Lord Elrond, and the Lady Galadriel," Curumo continued shortly, behaving as if I hadn't spoken. "We set out tomorrow at dawn. Thus concludes the meeting."
I was thunderstruck by the very abrupt ending the council had come to, and I think everyone else was as well, because while Curumo left the room, everyone else stayed put a moment longer. Nothing was said in the stunned silence, and slowly, we filed out and went to lunch.
From that point on, I didn't say a word out loud about it for fear that it would reach Curumo somehow, but I started to make plans to depart Imladris shortly after the company did and follow them to Dol Guldur.
Early the next morning, Celeborn and Círdan stood with Glorfindel and I in the courtyard as the rest of the company readied their horses.
"We'll keep things running smoothly while you're gone, Elrond, don't worry," I said to him as he made to open his mouth, no doubt to impart a laundry list of tasks he wanted us to carry out in his absence. "We've got it all sorted. Glorfindel and I will both tutor Estel. I'll take over foreign affairs, and Glorfindel will handle internal business," I elaborated with a nod, making myself sound as convincing as possible.
"Good," Elrond said with a relieved look. "Don't forget-"
"Already drafted the letters to King Fengel regarding weapons exchange," I reassured him. "I'll send them this morning. Good luck out there."
He smiled and nodded. I clapped him on the shoulder affectionately and with that, they mounted their horses and set off at a brisk pace. We stood there for a short while making conversation, and then wandered back inside for breakfast, where very little at all was said. After we'd eaten, Celeborn and Círdan went off to the library, presumably to gossip, and Glorfindel and I walked along the main corridor. Glorfindel made to open the door to Elrond's study to grab the papers he needed, but when he saw me keep walking, he followed me, confused.
"Don't say anything yet," I said to him in my head as I slipped a hand into his and we gently dropped our pace to a stroll. He smiled warmly, gave my hand a squeeze, and I silently led him back to our room.
When we were inside and the door was closed, Glorfindel spoke.
"So when are we leaving?"
I smiled. "You're coming, too?"
Glorfindel raised an eyebrow. "We haven't been apart a whole day since before we were betrothed, my love," he replied, giving me a knowing look. "Besides, we have nothing to fear there."
"I didn't think you'd want to miss out on the fun," I admitted with a grin. "I was going to simply inform you of where we'd be going."
"You know me so well," he returned with a small laugh. I reached out a hand and stroked his cheek tenderly for a moment before returning to the matter at hand.
"Now, we need a plausible lie for our sudden absence," I mused. "Who do we know that needs to see us right now?" I paced around the room, hands behind my back.
"You can disappear wherever you want at any time without explanation because you're a psychologist and have maintain confidentiality," Glorfindel said with a shrug. "Perhaps someone needs you in Mirkwood, and I am accompanying you for safety and companionship purposes."
My eyes widened. "You're a genius," I whispered. "Right, well, let's quickly send off those letters and apprise Erestor of his colossal workload."
Erestor, bless him down to his cotton socks, took the announcement in his stride and nodded understandingly.
"It must be quite severe to prompt you to travel so suddenly like this," he said, looking at me with concern. "I do hope all will be well."
"Thank you," I replied with a nod. "I hope so, too."
We set out just after lunch and spent the next few weeks essentially going from bush to bush as we followed our buddies (plus the old fart leading them). Our need to be secret put a complete moratorium on trampolining while en route, much to our shared chagrin. We had to make do with swinging about in the branches of trees with dense foliage instead. Better than nothing, certainly, but a part of me made a woeful sound every time we walked past a suitable trampoline mooring branch.
The scenery changed dramatically the closer we got to Dol Guldur. The grey discolouration pervaded through the sky like mould, and the land got progressively more barren the further we went. The grass wilted, animal life (with the exception of spies of Sauron and likely Curumo as well) was nonexistent, and flowers were a long-forgotten thing here. We had the devil's own job concealing ourselves for the last stretch, because we still had to both stay invisible while tailing them closely now. If the battle between them and Sauron went bad, we had to be ready to step in at a moment's notice. Thankfully, one or two miserable-looking trees dotted the landscape, and we pursued them closely in the night sufficiently that we were almost right behind them as they entered Dol Guldur proper.
The ruins at the top of the hill seemed to be the epicentre of all this destructive evil, and once they others had entered the dilapidated labyrinth, Glorfindel and I hurried in behind them, swords at the ready.
Though there was no roof over us, it was a remarkably easy place to get lost in. Luckily, we crept quietly enough that we could always keep the company in view as we pursued them, so at least if we were lost (and we almost certainly were at times), we'd be lost together.
Finally, after what felt like an age of wandering, we saw some sort of vestibule up ahead where most of these snaking corridors fed into, and for the first time since I arrived in Middle-Earth, I felt cold. The chill emanating from that area the air sank down into my bones, and when I looked over, I saw that Glorfindel had to bite down on his lips to stop his teeth from chattering.
When the others emerged from the hallway and into the middle of this, I quickly pulled Glorfindel off into a small alcove in case they turned around.
"Wait," I said to him in my head, holding up a hand and straining my ears.
Curumo's voice broke the silence as he proceeded to chant incantations in Quenya, demanding that whatever was evil in there show itself. When he finished the chant, he struck his staff on the ground, which propelled a huge wave of dust in all directions, the ground shaking violently beneath us as he did. An explosion issued forth from the floor that blasted everyone in the room but Curumo off their feet and hard against the wall, knocking them unconscious. The source of the cold seemed to rise from the crater the blast had left and I felt a thrill of terror as I recognised it even from the back, in its shredded garb and wrought iron mask, its right index finger missing. Sauron, finally in the flesh.
There was a strange moment where Curumo and Sauron seemed to lock eyes, and I wondered if Sauron had hypnotised Curumo somehow, because he placidly stood still as Sauron raised his arms. Elrond and co., all of whom had been out cold, were slowly starting to come to, but it would be too late if Sauron decided to act. Acting on a rush of adrenaline, I bolted up behind Sauron and locked my arms around him, pinning his arms down by his side as I held him to me.
"ATTACK HIM, CURUMO!" I yelled at him.
Curumo looked at me, and for a few moments he did nothing, merely watched on with a tiny frown as I squeezed a struggling Sauron to me as tightly as I could. Fear gripped me as I realised that he was still able to put up a fight against me, and I knew I couldn't hold him like this forever. Glorfindel now appeared from behind me and went straight to the others, stirring them roughly.
"CURUMO!" I screamed desperately, feeling a searing pain burn through every bit of me that was in contact with Sauron.
A tiny smile spread across Curumo's lips as I howled in agony, the sickening smell of burning flesh filling my nostrils. Luckily, in that moment, Olórin and Galadriel were moving, and along with Glorfindel, were all able to exact one single, tripartite blow on Sauron, with Elrond and Aiwendil now hurrying toward us. Before Elrond and Aiwendil could strike too, though, Sauron dematerialised as though he had turned to sand. He slid out from underneath my arms and shot away, his freezing grey shadow on his heels as he broke out of the ruins with another deafening boom and fled to the east.
"Rhodri? Glorfindel?" Elrond spluttered as he walked up to the two of us, "how did-"
He was cut off as I pushed him gently to the side and rounded on Curumo now, incandescent with rage as he watched back at me with a hint of a sneer on his face.
"What," I hissed at him through gritted teeth, my voice rising with each word until it was a shout, "in fuck's name did you think you were DOING?"
He didn't get a chance to reply. In a complete loss of temper, I backhanded Curumo across the face so hard that I felt half the bones in his head crack on impact. The force of the blow sent him to the ground and broke the tiles underneath him.
A gasp came from all present, including myself, as the stretching motion I'd made had aggravated the burns I had sustained. Well, all but Curumo, who was not in a position to do much of anything except lie still and groan quietly.
"Rhodri!" exclaimed Elrond in admonishment, my stomach turning as he looked at me in- was it horror? Anger? Fear, perhaps? Glorfindel, alarmed, ran over beside me and put a hand on my shoulder supportively.
"He was about to let all of you die at Sauron's hands," I replied furiously. Looking down at Curumo, whose face was already covered in bruises and had started to swell, I pointed a finger at him threateningly.
"You had better have a miraculously good explanation for your lack of action back there," I snarled down at him.
Olórin strode over to him and gave me a warning look not to intervene as he turned Curumo onto his back and murmured enchantments that made his face return to its usual size and colour.
Curumo shook his head gently and sat up. "I was hypnotised by Sauron," he declared, rising to his feet and regarding me with disgust.
I returned his look. "Don't lie to me," I spat. "I saw you smile as he burned my flesh!" I gestured at my seared arms and torso. "You wanted him to strike!" Olórin and Aiwendil looked at their leader in shock.
"I wanted nothing of the sort," he returned coldly, pretending the eyes of his colleagues weren't on him.
"Even if you had intended to step in," I continued angrily, "you obviously failed, because you were so easily- and for so long- sucked in by Sauron's hollow promises, and it could have cost everyone their lives. This, at the very least, shows your total lack of capacity as leader of the White Council!"
"How dare you!" he roared back, his face turning red now as he started to make toward me.
A smile twisted my face. "Oh, you want another one, do you?" I taunted, beckoning him over before bunching my hands up into fists. "Come on, then, I'll give you a proper boxing this time."
"Enough!" said Galadriel authoritatively, stepping in between us before a brawl could ensue. "We have done what we set out to do for now. It is time to depart this place and make for our realms again as we monitor this situation, but we will not air our grievances between each other here where it might be seen!" She looked at us severely, and I knew I had just had my arse served to me.
I accepted my telling-off with a nod. "Good point, Galadriel. I do apologise for my lack of discretion." Wincing, I bent my arm to touch my hand to my heart in a gesture of sincerity, which was well received. She gave me a forgiving smile, and with that, we were out of there.
When we were out on the miraculously revitalised grass again, Curumo disappeared southward without a word.
"You should let me have a look at those burns," Olórin said in a grave tone, gesturing pointedly at my arms and torso. They were raw, but the darkened blood was even darker than usual- almost black, in fact.
"Please do," I invited. "They hurt like hell."
Olórin gently took one of my arms, inspecting the forearm with a wrinkled brow.
"Sauron seems to have gained part of a physical form from enchantments like the ones in the cursed Morgul blades, which, it would seem, burns on impact," he concluded with surprise after a moment.
"I didn't know that Morgul burns even existed," I whispered in shock.
"Neither did I," Olórin murmured. He held his staff over me and started chanting incantations in Valarin. The Elves, not liking the sound of the language, frowned a little.
I let out a small gasp of pain as the burn seemed to get sucked out, corroding me as much on the way out as it had upon entry. After a few minutes of discomfort, though, my upper half was good as new, if slightly exposed by the missing material. Luckily, I had a cape that I tied around me like some sort of freakish toga.
"Thanks for the help, Olórin," I said gratefully.
Olórin smiled at me. "A shame Aulë didn't craft a set of chains for you as well," he replied in a tongue-in-cheek tone, clapping me on the shoulder.
Olórin departed for Erebor shortly after that, leaving the remaining four of us to journey back to Imladris together- on foot, as Elrond and Galadriel's horses had fled after the explosions. Initially, Elrond and Galadriel acted a little distanced from me, and though it wounded me to see it, I gave them plenty of space and walked with Glorfindel instead.
"Are you upset with me?" I asked Glorfindel in my head on the first evening, not daring to meet his eyes.
I felt a hand touch my chin and gently turn my head. Reluctantly, I looked up and saw Glorfindel watching me lovingly.
"No," he replied as he shook his head. "A little surprised, perhaps, since I have never seen you lose your temper before, but you know I trust your judgement about Curumo, and him doing what you said he did was a very dangerous thing."
I glanced over at Elrond and Galadriel, who were sleeping fitfully a short way away. "Will they forgive me?"
"There is nothing to forgive. They are merely rattled by the events of today."
"You think so?" I felt hope surge in me.
"I am sure of it. They will come around soon enough."
I smiled at Glorfindel. "Are you doing all right after everything today, yourself?"
He nodded calmly. "I am quite fine. What of you?"
"I'm relieved you're safe. I wasn't sure what would happen for a while there." I drank his face in for a minute before pulling him over to me and holding him closely. He wrapped his arms around me and smiled up at me.
Sure enough, Glorfindel was right- mostly, anyway. Galadriel settled back down with me fairly quickly and admitted to me later that she was having strong doubts about Curumo's suitability as leader of the White Council. Elrond, however, didn't mention the issue again until we got back to Imladris, and though he treated me perfectly fine (albeit with a little more distance than usual), I could see he was troubled by it still, a few days after we'd returned. That, in turn, troubled me. We had been best friends for almost three millennia now, and the thought of drifting apart from a bottled-up misunderstanding frightened me.
I decided, as I stood outside his study one afternoon in preparation for Happy Hour, that now was the time to discuss it.
I knocked hesitantly, and the voice within asked, "Who is it?"
"It's Rhodri," I answered.
There was silence for a moment, and then the door opened, revealing a puzzled-looking Elrond.
"That was a rather odd knock, Rhodri. You usually have a very distinct rhythm." He rapped out the shave-and-a-haircut rhythm on the door jamb.
"Sorry. Bit antsy," I confessed.
"So it seems," he remarked. "Do you want to talk about it?"
"That would be good, actually," I said with a relieved sigh, and followed him inside. He followed me out to the balcony with the customary wine and we took our usual seats.
"Tell me what troubles you, Rhodri," he said, watching me with interest.
I drummed my fingers on the armrest of my chair agitatedly. "I can't work out how to word it," I murmured.
"You don't have to use beautiful words with me, you know," Elrond reassured me. "At this point, we are essentially siblings." He gave me the first genuine smile I'd seen on him in months, and it was like a balm for my racing mind. But then, if he was being genuine, why was he like this?
"Well, all right," I said uneasily. "I'll get to the heart of the matter, then: you've been acting differently this last little while, and it's got me a bit worried."
"What do you mean?" he asked, though he didn't seem surprised. In fact, it seemed like I had confirmed a suspicion of his, and he wanted to know more.
"You've been somewhat distant of late," I elaborated. "A little more reserved. And, well, since it seemed to happen around the time we went to Dol Guldur, I'm concerned that I've done something to unsettle you or make you suspicious of me."
Elrond sighed and nodded. "It's true, Dol Guldur has had an impact on me in a way. I still do not know much about what happened after hitting that wall left me unconscious, and I was afraid to ask you for an account of it in case it upset you."
"Well, I'm an open book," I guaranteed quickly. "I probably should have told you this earlier, but I keep my mind very open for Glorfindel, you, Celebrían, Bregedúr, and Gil-Galad. Just you five. I purposely make it easy for you all to read me as easily as Galadriel can. My memories, with the exceptions of my romantic, medical, and professional life, plus confidential information entrusted to me by others, are all readily available as well."
Elrond raised his eyebrows. "That is putting an awful lot at others' fingertips."
I shrugged. "I trust you," I said simply. "What do I have to worry about?"
His expression softened. "I am touched, Rhodri," he said with a quiet smile.
I clapped him on the shoulder, hoping to keep him on track before he got sentimental. "Now, do you want to see what happened while you were out cold?" I asked.
He nodded, and when I locked eyes with him, I could feel his vision penetrate my mind like a torch shining through the windows. I summoned the memory, and for a vivid few minutes, he was me. A thrill of panic seemed to envelop him when he saw Sauron rise through the floor and watch Curumo. He gasped when he felt Sauron wriggle in his arms and Curumo watched on. I heard a harsh, furious exhalation as he caught sight of Curumo's smirk and made to smack him in the chops.
I kept him in the memory just a little bit longer so Elrond could feel the fear I experienced the moment after I had belted Curumo to the ground and heard Elrond castigate me, fixing me with that wide-eyed, disbelieving frown.
With that, the memory had come to a close, and our eye contact broke.
"Oh, Rhodri," Elrond said contritely after a moment. "I wish I'd known sooner. I should have asked."
"You're perfectly within your rights to be suspicious of a situation you weren't awake for, Elrond," I said matter-of-factly. "You really woke up at a rather awkward time, and the reason I gave you then was less than informative."
"I didn't suspect your character in any way," Elrond clarified. "I did, however, worry that you… I don't really know."
"Got carried away with an idea for which I had no proof?" I suggested mildly.
"Not even that, but rather what your punching him would determine for the White Council, and if he would simply flee to Sauron as a result," he said heavily.
"But then, if he is as far gone as you maintain, we would not have swayed him either way."
"If only," I groaned. "Smug, power-hungry wastrel that he is."
Elrond raised his eyebrows in agreement and took a sip of wine. "This is a frightening time to be alive."
"You said a mouthful there, mate."
