Keep You Like an Oath by StarSpray  

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i will stumble in the dark

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There’s not a road I know that leads to anywhere
Without a light, I fear that I will stumble in the dark
Lay right down, decide not to go on
- “Sound the Bugle” by Bryan Adams

- - 

 

“Will you swear it, kinslayer?”

“Yes.”

- - -

It is very dark. Daeron kneels on hard stone, arms bound behind him with heavy chains. A presence looms unseen behind him, but cold—so cold that he can’t breathe. His hair falls in matted tangles around his face. He can’t hear past the harsh sound of his own gasps and the pounding of his heart in his ears. 

- - - 

Lightning pierces the night, and thunder crashes around him on the mountainside. He slides down the muddy slope as rain slants down, cold and hard on his face; he strayed from the path fleeing orcs, and now he does not know which way to go, which way is west—but he must go west, he must. He cannot remember why in this moment but he must reach the Sea— 

- - - 

Everything is freezing. 

- - - 

He sits upon a hillside under a young slender aspen tree as it quakes in the breeze, leaves shivering above his head. Before him stretches the upper vales of the great river, which flows steadily along, gleaming under the summer sun. Wildflowers grow upon its banks amid the green grass. A deer grazes at the bottom of the hill, unconcerned with Daeron at all, and butterflies flit from blossom to blossom, seeking sweet nectar. It is a beautiful sight, the river valley in high summer. He sees it, he knows it, and yet he feels nothing. 

- - - 

“I swear by the sun and stars—”

- - - 

“Daeron.” A hand on his forehead, soft and warm. A power surrounds him that is as familiar as the smell of niphredil, and as painful. He cries out and tries to pull away, but he cannot move. It presses on his mind and it hurts—it hurts and it hurts, and there is nothing left of him to take, and he is still bound, he can feel the pull of that freezing invisible chain lodged in his chest, north and west, can feel still the Witch-king’s mind as he also reaches out, gasping, so confident that he has already won. Daeron is caught between two powers, stretched taut, each trying to snare him for their own purposes and he just wants it to stop—

- - - 

“How could you, Daeron?” Lúthien’s face appears before him, her soft twilit eyes wide and wounded.

“Lúthien,” he tries to say, tries to reach for her, but she turns away and vanishes into the tree-shadows before his hand reaches hers—only to reappear on his other side with a knife like the one that sliced through his chest and spirit at once, dull silver on the blade, and he cries out as she thrusts it towards him, her eyes gone dark and empty as the space beneath the Witch-king’s crown. “Lúthien, mercy—!”

- - - 

Clawed fingers grasp his hair and yank his head back, so he stares up into an empty cowl, upon which sits a tarnished silver crown. There is the suggestion of a face there, ancient and ruinous, but a cold radiates from the not-dead-not-living creature that sinks into him like teeth. Daeron can’t stop himself from crying out, and tries to jerk back but the orc does not let go and all that happens is some of his hair is torn out by the roots. “What have we here?” hisses a thin and terrible voice as the creature before him reaches out its mind and will, seeking to look into Daeron’s, to take hold of it. “An elf wandering alone—an elf halfway gone from this world already?” 

“We found him wandering near the downs,” says someone else. A man, not one of the orcs. “We thought you would rather deal with this prisoner yourself, my lord.”

“So I would,” says the creature, and pain erupts behind Daeron’s eyes. “A mighty singer, this one was, once upon a time. A useful servant of the Dark Tower, he may yet prove.”

“No,” Daeron gasps. “No, I won’t—” An iron-shod boot slams into his stomach and he doubles over, choking. 

“You will,” says the terrible not-dead-not-living thing, as chains are brought, new-forged and sharp-edged. 

- - - 

“—with the earth itself as my witness—”

- - - 

The Witch-king’s power surrounds him, plunges into his chest, burrows under his skin, into his veins, and he screams as he burns and freezes and burns again, as though both his body and his spirit are coming apart at the seams, and when he dies at last there will be nothing left of him for Mandos to call. 

- - - 

He does not know where he is, he does not know how long he has been there. He cannot remember, sometimes, his own name. Other names spill from his lips as he calls out for help that he knows won’t come—all of them dead and gone and lost to him forever. He is alone and there is no one left in the world that cares whether Daeron of long-drowned Doriath still draws breath. 

It is not knives and whips that they bring but fell enchantments and ugly spells that seek to rip him to shreds from the inside out, and it is working, he can feel it working and he does not want to die, not like this, not in the dark. If he can just see the stars again, if he could draw his last breath under their soft light maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, maybe—

- - - 

“Daeron,” says that voice that is like Lúthien’s but isn’t. The power that is like Melian’s but isn’t wraps around him, burning hot, a punishment instead of a balm. A hand presses onto his chest over the frozen scar and he screams— 

- - - 

“Daeron, please. Do you know me?” A familiar face swims into focus, eyes bright beneath a fall of dark hair, hands cradling his face like it’s something fragile and precious. He knows the face but he cannot remember the name. It should be there but he does not know it. He hardly knows his own name, or where he is. There is flowing water nearby. There is a bird singing a familiar song that he wants to hear more of, because maybe if he hears it in full he will remember why it makes him want to weep. 

He cannot see beyond the face before him. It is all shadows and nothingness. “It is so dark,” he hears himself whisper. It is dark and the color is all gone; he cannot remember what colors are. There is only black and grey. There is something in his chest pulling on him, pulling him north, and in the far distance he hears a voice calling for him, fell and fearsome, and he no longer has the strength to fight it.

“Please, Daeron, please hold on.” The hands on his face are warm. 

He cannot breathe. “It’s so—so cold—” His lips form a name but he cannot hear it. He hears a response but the words turn into a meaningless jumble of sounds…

- - - 

Bells are ringing and the Witch-king is calling and there is a voice like thundering waves somewhere behind him and he cannot move and he is so scared— 

- - - 

Everything is burning. 

- - - 

“—I will see you safe and alive to the House of Elrond, or perish myself in the attempt.”

- - - 

He stands under the blazing silver stars beside the Esgalduin. Its music is silenced. Niphredil blooms around him but as he watches they wither, and the trees begin to topple, one by one, crashing soundlessly together as the world shakes itself apart. When he tries to call for someone—anyone—all he hears is the sound of the Witch-king’s laughter.