Dark Judgement 9

Dark Judgement

Part 9 - Maglor

Posted: June 29, 2007

*****

I do not know how long I slept. Sometimes I nearly reached consciousness and I vaguely remember a hand stroking my head and telling me to go back to sleep. The low, gentle voice was irresistible and I could not help but do as it bid. During these moments of near lucidity, I became aware of the pain from my injuries. It was a relief to fall into the numbing deep sleep.

The same dream occurred each time I experienced a near awakening. In it, Maglor would be on the bed and I would stand over him stroking his head and urging him to go to sleep so that the pain would diminish. In reality, I gave no thought to his pain. I did not care that he suffered for hours and days after I tortured him. The only thrill I sought were his screams when the pain was inflicted. Yet he never gave me that satisfaction. He never cried out in front of me. That is what kept him alive. He became a challenge and I paid him much more attention than any other elf I captured. I wanted to break him. I wanted to crush his spirit, but instead a grudging respect for him formed and so I grew bored with mere physical torture and sought more subtle ways to hurt him.

I tortured elves to death in front of him and yet he showed no emotion. I did not care about the ages of the elves or their sex; all were for my pleasure, and it made me happy to kill them in front of Maglor. The only time I ever saw any reaction was when I tortured a young human who cried and pleaded with me not to hurt him. I looked at Maglor and told him that it was because of him that I was killing the boy and that his lack of reaction was forcing me to carry out increasingly evil acts. He looked at me and said that it was better that the boy died now because in the end I would kill him anyway.

That night I heard Maglor crying. It was not the first time and would not be the last, but it infuriated me that he would not give me the reaction I desired to my face. It was as though he was the one in control. More than ever, I wanted to break him and I resolved to do so. I would always fail in this and I truly think that even if he had shown emotion, I would not have been satisfied. I suspect he knew this and even though I tried all the ways I knew to make him break, he was always ahead of me. It was as though he understood and denied me in a seemingly futile bid to play me at my own game.

From time to time I would heal Maglor so that his body would show no imperfections, then I would torture and mar him all over again. I healed his body frequently, but I could never reach his mind. That was for him alone. At one point, I stopped because Maglor became mute after the orcs who were supposed to be guarding him abused him. He did not attempt to defend himself and I saw that he did not focus when they attacked him. It was as though he was blind. My infuriation at the treatment of my slave meant that every orc in the room paid with their life. I led Maglor out of the room and asked him how the orcs had released him from his cell to which I held the only key. He asked who I was. After that, he did not cry in private and looked blankly through me; he had no idea of his surroundings, or who I was.

The orcs ruined everything. They tipped him over the edge and it did not matter what I did now; he was unreachable. It was useless for me to kill him as I would remain unfulfilled. To torture him would give no reaction either. I chained him to the wall whilst I decided what to do with him. It occurred to me that orcs could not look after him so I ordered two of the female slaves to take care of his needs. They reported to me that he never said a word and that they had to feed him. A few months later the fortress fell. The ring fell into the lava of Mount Doom and everything changed.

The moving painting on the wall showed clearly that Maglor knew what was going on when the tower fell and that he was going to die. Did he wake just before the event or was he never lost, but upping the game so that I would be forced into another course of action. He was an enigma even now. Nienna said that Maglor’s mind was totally gone. Was he playing a game with the Valar as well or was he genuine? I did not know, but I was intrigued.

All of my dreams were about Maglor. He haunted me and every thought reminded me of him. I needed to know how he was. I needed to see him again. I had to know that in spite of all I did to him that he was all right. That he had won.

“Wake up, Sauron.” Nienna gently shook my shoulder and I awoke. There was no pain and when I looked, my body showed no sign of injury. She reached over, touched my cheek, and smeared the wetness away with her thumb. “A tear,” she said. “Is it for you or for Maglor?”

I looked away as I felt the sting of salt in my eyes. I hid my face in the pillow and my body shook. All the time I wondered why I was reacting in this way. Why did I care? I knew not the answer except that I needed to know, more than anything, that Maglor had survived his time with me, just as I had survived my time beyond the Door. It was a bond of sorts that we shared and I felt an empathy that comes from experience. I knew his terror and his pain, the loss of hope and a bleak existence full of despair. I also experienced the fear of darkness and the unknown terrors that form in one’s mind when there is no light.

“Answer me, Sauron. Is the tear for you or for Maglor?” Her face was hard and uncompromising. I knew I had to tell the truth and use detail.

“I gave up long ago feeling sorry for myself. I would like to say it is for Maglor, but I do not know. I know that I caused him much suffering, so perhaps my experiences through the Door mean that I identify with him so, maybe the tear is for me too. I really do not know.”

“A good and thoughtful answer, Sauron. What would you do if we let you see Maglor again?” Nienna smiled and played with the red feather decoration on her fan, stroking the individual vanes with her slender fingers.

“I do not know. Is it possible?”

She motioned over to the wall. A moving painting appeared and therein sat Maglor, with long red hair, on the edge of a bed holding a soft toy rabbit. An elf was talking to him whilst feeding him what looked like porridge. He paid no attention to the elf and stared blankly at the wall behind his helper. I felt the tear spill over my lower lid and I knew the answer to her question.

“I do not want him to see me. I do not want him to suffer anymore. I do not want to be his version of Melkor because I know how that feels.” The tears were now running freely down my face and I kept wiping them away, but they would not stop.

“I do believe you are developing a heart, Sauron. You used to have one and now it is coming back.” Nienna smiled and then could not contain herself. She laughed and tapped me on the shoulder with her fan. “Guess what?” I looked miserably at her. “Because we have a warped sense of fun and it suits our purpose, we have made Maglor your soul mate. You will love him like no one else and that is why you cry for him now.” She threw a set of leggings and a shirt to me and told me to put them on.

I was being manipulated and yet what choice did I have? The painting on the wall cleared. “Remember that we are always watching you, Sauron. There is nothing you can do that we do not see.”

I wondered why she said this, but then my attention was taken by the formation of a door in the wall. Nienna opened the door and she gestured for me to go through. The elf feeding Maglor looked at me in terror. No doubt he had met me before. I cannot say that this distressed me because it did not. In fact, I derived a certain amount of satisfaction that I was still able to inspire such a reaction. The elf looked at Nienna who asked him to leave the room.

Maglor sat on the bed still holding his toy rabbit and looking so innocent and so lost. I looked at Nienna and she told me to go to him. I was not hopeful, I thought he would reject me or become hysterical when he realised that I was in the room. I sat beside him and he did not react or even acknowledge that I was by him. I gently turned his face and he looked at me with blank eyes.

“Do you know who I am, Maglor?” I wondered if he even saw me.

“Maglor, Maglor, Maglor...” He repeated his name several times then held his toy rabbit up to me. “Maglor.” He stroked the rabbit and said Maglor three more times.

I looked at Nienna for help and she smiled. “You are doing well. From now on, you will care for him. Remember any abuse will result in an eternity spent through the Door.”

“I do not know if I can do this.” I was so uncertain. I did not trust myself. I stood to lose everything.

“We do not demand anything more of you than of what you are capable. This will teach you many things of which you are lacking now.” She walked back through the door and just before leaving, told me that I could ask for her at any time, and she would come.

I was left alone in the room with Maglor, who looked at the wall. The room was large and a bathroom and toilet was off to one side. A door led to a large garden; when it stopped raining we could go outside.

“Maglor.” I stroked the side of his face.

The toy rabbit was shown to me and Maglor said his own name again. “No, you are Maglor. Maglor is you, not the rabbit.”

He became more insistent and something in me broke. It was not the orcs; I made him like this. He simply could not take any more. I held him close and hugged him. His head lay against my chest as I gently rocked him and told him how sorry I was. All the time he said his name, over and over again and stroked the toy rabbit.

*****

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