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permanentlyexhaustedpigeon88 · 4 months ago

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The Abhorred | Adar/OC (part 1)

Summary: It is a moment Maethoriel never imagined, but the empty raiment at her feet proves that it had, indeed, come to pass. Sauron is dead. She should feel relief, but all that she knows instead is a sense of fear over a world that will see not only herself, but her companions as monsters to be eradicated at any cost. It is a fear that will pull her away from the only one who ever kept her safe. And she is hardly blind to how holding on to that fear almost certainly risks keeping her forever adrift from the one that she loves.

Warnings: angst, some hints of Stockholm syndrome, references to torture, it's gonna get pretty dark in here, folks. Warnings will be updated as the series goes on.

Tag-list: please let me know if you would like to be tagged for future updates!

A/N: Whelp...I've gone and done it. And I am freaking terrified that I will somehow mess this up! The vision in my head is something I am so, so very excited about, but imposter syndrome is a thing, and I'm not 100% confident I can pull it off. I suppose only time will tell?

Either way, though, this one is for all of my fellow Adar-girlies! He deserves all of the attention and love he can get, and I really hope that the demented little plot gremlins running amok in my mind have created something that at least some of you will enjoy!

It was not supposed to end like this.

That is the only thought the woman seems capable of as she stares down at the place where he once was. Where the one who had caused her so much pain had rested, dead. Gone. No more. Some small part of her knows that she should feel relief. That she should be pleased at his demise.

Now, though, all that she can seem to understand is the bone deep feeling of regret.

"I am your only future!"

The words ring inside her mind like the clamor of bells, a warning against any thought of breaking free. Of even attempting to seek another path that did not align with his plans. His plans, that only ever brought dissent and terror and pain. Still, she stares at the emptiness of the fabrics at her feet, shallow breaths rattling inside of her chest as her mind recalls that those fabrics once held his form. Sauron's form.

She cannot move. Cannot tear her eyes from the ground. She can barely even breathe, and the walls seem to close in from all sides. Silence surrounds her as all those that had been in the hall from the start take in what has just transpired, though they can hardly believe it to be true. It isn't until she feels the presence of another, moving to stand beside her, that she begins to return to herself, but when a hand rests upon her shoulders, everything within her is suddenly possessed by a desire to wrench herself away.

"Maethoriel—"

"What have you done?"

Muted though it may be, the inquiry lands like a blow upon the person standing beside her. Someone she once trusted, but the one who had now blown apart every last bit of the world she once knew. Her eyes search his face, desperate. Pleading for some sign that this was not, in fact, his plan all along, but she finds nothing. Nothing to indicate her wild hope is warranted. Nothing, save for the vindication of one who has, at long last, achieved a goal.

"What have you done?"

"I have done what was necessary to secure our freedom."

"Freedom," The woman scoffs, another step creating still more distance between herself and the one who stands beside her, something not all that far from pity more than apparent within his gaze, "What you have done is cast us out into the world to live in exile."

"We will survive, Maethoriel."

"As beings who are to be turned away by everyone we meet? As those who would be hunted for crimes that are unforgivable?"

"The true mind behind those crimes is dead."

"And we are the poorer for it!"

Bile rises to the back of the woman's throat as soon as the words are spoken, because even though a part of her believes them, there is another, private part of her mind that wishes with everything she has that she did not. She would be a fool to deny that acting in league with Sauron had brought them nothing but misery. That he had been a terror, holding everything he touched in thrall with an iron fist.

Still, after everything, there had been a sense of—if not belonging, then at least one of temporary respite. They had a home, even if it were not the most desirable.

Hardly able to stand those thoughts as they rise to the forefront of her mind, Maethoriel attempts to rebel against them. She tries with all her might to understand that what her companion has just done was exactly what was needed all along.

Silent, he watches her carefully. An expression that she cannot decipher appears in familiar features, and cuts through her, down to her very bones. Mere moments ago, the two of them had been standing, united, or so she had believed at the time, and now?

Now, it is as though a chasm exists between them. One it seems nothing can bridge.

It was not supposed to end like this.

"I am your only future! And my path, your only path."

The man standing before her had all but destroyed that future with a single blow.

Confusion flares within her as Maethoriel continues to stand rooted to the spot, chest heaving with the effort of continuing to breathe. With the effort of forcing herself to recall every moment of torment—every scar earned—the longer she had remained at Sauron's side. She reminds herself of each day spent hunting. Spent killing. Nights, consumed with another sort of conflict best left unspoken.

Every last one of them in the hall with her had suffered the same, and the prospect of freedom from such pain seemed far too alluring to be real. It was too alluring to be real, given the reality of facing judgment from those who had once flocked to their side.

Men, and elves, and dwarves alike would look upon them with nothing shy of hatred. She knows this as surely as anything else she has seen in her lifetime. But in spite of it, she also knows that she should feel relief that Sauron is gone. She should feel relief that the one who would see them all enslaved will never be able to harm any one of them ever again.

The regret she feels over her inability to genuinely give in to such a thing is nearly enough to bring her to her knees.

"...my path, your only path."

All of the deception—the betrayal at Sauron's hands—and even still, Maethoriel cannot seem to rid herself of the notion that this coup had been folly. That it would serve to do all of them far more harm than good. She cannot help but feel the flames of a dull sort of anger towards the one still standing beside her, and that more than anything else feels like the serrated edge of a knife slicing against her heart.

"What—what am I to do?"

Her voice cracks over the words, and the sting of unshed tears burns at her eyes, forcing Maethoriel to avert her gaze, rather than continuing to look the man beside her in the eye any longer. The idea of facing the betrayal he likely feels over her outburst is simply too much for her to bear.

Already, her heart yearns for forgiveness, though she begins to suspect that is a thing that will not come easily. Not when this apparent victory had been so hard-won. And even when she feels the warmth of fingertips not encased in a gauntlet's cold grip come to rest beneath her chin, turning her face upward once more, Maethoriel hardly dares to breathe.

"I will not force your allegiance, Maethoriel. Not as he did."

The fingers beneath her chin move, for a moment, so that the warm callouses of a familiar palm come to rest against her cheek in their stead, and Maethoriel wants to lean into that touch. She wants to savor that small bit of gentleness, and keep it close, forever.

Before she can make any move at doing so, however, the sensation is gone. Pulled from her at such speed she can hardly reconcile herself with its loss. Again, she averts her gaze, this time to avoid looking directly at the sight of her companion turning to depart. A low chant begins to echo around the hall while she struggles to choose. Stay with the empty raiment resting at her feet, or follow after one who, in spite of recent acts, she has come to love beyond reason.

Her thoughts are an amalgamation of pain, and regret, and confusion, but even then, she does not miss the words spoken to her, and clearly intended to be said in parting, spoken so lowly that even she nearly struggles to hear.

"I cannot choose your path for you. You must do that for yourself."

"I am your only future!"

A sob works its way up Maethoriel's throat whether she wishes it to or not, the sound drowned out amongst the tramp of feet as those who had waited in the rapidly emptying hall move to depart. A singular glance shows her that her companion is now entirely gone from her sight, his tall frame swallowed completely by the throng of those he called his children.

Slowly, she turns to depart as well, though her path leads in the opposite direction from the rest. She steels herself against the pain that winds its way like a vice around her heart.

Knowing that at least one of them would not be alone serves as meager reassurance when compared to the cost of her own choices. The cost of her own inability to free herself from Sauon's hold, even now. Now that he is gone.

The strange sense of grief that she feels over his passing only adds fuel to the fire that is now lending speed to her movements as she makes her way through darkened hallways. As she begins to consider the reality of an eternity spent in the shadows. And even if she knows not where she should go, or how she will spend that eternity now that it is staring her in the face, Maethoriel does know one simple thing.

Of the two of them, she is abundantly grateful that it will be her, and not Adar, that must endure it alone.

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permanentlyexhaustedpigeon88 · 30 days ago

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The Abhorred | Adar/OC (part 3)

Warnings: angst, some hints of Stockholm syndrome, references to torture, creepy Sauron being creepy, mind games and manipulation, removal of free will, murder, some blood and gore, it's gonna get pretty dark in here, folks. Warnings will be updated as the series goes on.

Other: Hello there, darling readers! And welcome (finally) to a brand new chapter! I am so, so sorry for the delay, particularly as I have no real excuse outside of getting momentarily preoccupied with a few other WIPs, but I promise, I am nowhere near finished with Maethoriel's tale! And if this chapter seemed a little…disjointed…there is a definitive reason for that, as well! Our girl has been through a lot, with Sauron messing around with her body and her mind. Something I thought would be bound to have some side effects, so hopefully where I'm taking things (sort of) makes sense?

As always, my heartfelt thanks go out to each and every one of you that have taken the time to read this story so far! I truly do appreciate the support, and I hope you all continue to enjoy where the story goes from here!

Tag-list: @humongousgalaxycoffee, @emo--chanel

Part One Part Two

Wandering the forests alone, Maethoriel is powerless to deny the realization that her perception of her own reality appears to be—slipping.

It starts out small, at first. So small, she very nearly misses it, convincing herself that the shadows she sees hidden amongst the foliage are a simple trick of the light. That the whispers she hears are nothing more than wisps of wind, brushing against deadened leaves. After all, moving in the darkness, rather than risking travel by daylight, these are the things she brings upon herself, or so she believes.

It had seemed a simple choice, at the time. To avoid risk of discovery, she would need to move when most others she might encounter would be asleep. She'd done much the same, before, under—him. Under Sauron.

Why, then, should this time be any different?

The thought sustains her, at least for a time, and Maethoriel finds that she is able to use that sustenance to press on, though the whispers and shadows dog her every step without relenting. She lasts an innumerable amount of days clinging to it, wrapping it around her frame like some sort of invisible shield.

Over time, however, that shield begins to fade. It begins to exist as nothing more than tatters, that can be blown away from her rather easily by a stray burst of wind. And that is when it happens. When her fragile grip on what is real, and what is not, begins to fray.

The whispers change into voices not long after.

Voices she thought never to hear again.

"Maethoriel…Maethoriel, come inside, child."

Blood freezing to ice within her veins, Maethoriel casts her gaze around her, desperate to find reason to be hearing the voice of someone she knew to be long dead. Her throat seems to constrict, the tears that prick at the corners of her eyes threatening to spill over at any moment.

Heart aching, she remains rooted in place, the words that had so chilled her echoing around her at every turn, and that is when the shadows that stalk her steps seem to converge, surrounding her as another voice moves to join the first.

"You will never see your family—your homeland—again. You know this."

Unable to resist the tremor that rolls through her frame, Maethoriel finally forces leaden limbs to move forward. She stumbles over unseen obstructions, her palm scraping against the bark of a nearby tree to catch her balance.

It is that second voice that sparks her terror. That causes her pulse to quicken in response to its almost insidious beauty. The words it speaks are true. She knows this, and it is that truth that renders them all the more painful, but even so, when the first voice breaks through once more, Maethoriel harkens to it like a moth drawn to flame.

"Maethoriel—come—come inside."

Step by careful step, she continues moving forward, drawn by some invisible string, despite the small, nagging voice at the back of her mind that urges her to believe none of this can possibly be real, but in her mind's eye, she can picture it so clearly. A small dwelling, nestled between great oak trees. Firelight glimmering in the hearth, and the sound of singing taking wing in the air.

In a small space between the trees up ahead, she can almost see it. The image is wispy, as though made of smoke, but it is enough to keep her moving forward. It is enough to have her clinging to falsehood while the rational side of her mind screams in protest and futility.

As she continues stumbling forward, heedless of the torn skin of her palms as she moves from tree to tree, Maethoriel ignores those screams, determined to reach the place that her heart seems to yearn for the most. But when she approaches the space between the trees, it suddenly vanishes, ripped from her sight, for it had never truly been there, at all.

"—come inside…"

"Mother. Mother, please—"

"Your mother is dead, Maethoriel. You killed her."

"No!"

The exclamation leaves her without warning, horror apparent behind the singular word, and Maethoriel whirls in place, for the accusation that sparked such a vehement feeling within her seemed to come from somewhere behind where she stands. In the darkness, of course, she can see nothing, but she can feel a certain malevolence surrounding her, all the same.

Her breaths seem to roar around her in the sudden silence, the fading of the image of her home in her mind allowing her to see the starkness of the trees surrounding her once more. The longer she remains motionless, the more her terror over the second voice seems to grow.

Like the first, it echoes inside of her mind, though it does not inspire warmth, or longing. It does not inspire thoughts of home and family.

Rather, it brings her to memories of pain and torment. Grief. Despair. Her own, and that which she brought to others in service of one who held space for neither pity nor remorse. And it is those memories that render her powerless to resist the pull of the shadowy figure moving through the bracken a mere few steps away.

A figure she has always been drawn to even with full awareness of all of the horrors she had suffered under his hand.

Rushing forward, however, it is hardly long before Maethoriel comes to realize that the faster she moves, the farther that figure seems to be from where she stands. That its speed seems nearly doubled by her own. A realization that pauses her steps, and likewise does the same to the figure, as well.

Her mouth opens on instinct to call out. To plead with that figure to slow until she might catch up, but no sound comes out. To her dismay, she is capable of uttering only a single, solitary gasp.

A chill passes through her yet again, causing gooseflesh to erupt upon the skin of her arms. But even if a part of her knows she should take this as a sign to stop pursuing the figure, Maethoriel pushes herself to hurry forward, once more.

Even as the voice that sparked such terror within her speaks yet again.

"So much pain and death, and all by your hand. My pretty little fool—"

A curious sort of rage seems to fuel her, then, rising at odds with the curiosity and trepidation that had been her constant companions for so long they felt like a second skin. It is a rage that lends fire to her veins, until her feet are moving forward for an entirely different reason than they had been, before.

Though she would never be one to deny that the voice is hardly wrong—that there had been atrocities carried out with her own two hands—Maethoriel still chafes beneath the knowledge of why she had perpetrated such things, underneath it all. She recalls the unyielding compulsion that had rested within her mind each and every time.

Each time she had even attempted fighting back, or issuing any form of denial, Sauron's retribution had been swift. Merciless and never ending. The scars from that vengeance, both within, and without, serve as a near constant reminder of the price of her foolhardiness.

A price that seems to have awakened just by her mere consideration of it, given the cry that echoes around her, filling her heart with fear.

"Get away from my daughter."

The figure she had been chasing disappears, replaced this time by the sight and sounds of a skirmish where it had been standing. Maethoriel's breath strangles around a sob, as the wavering edges of her vision solidify, and she watches as her father throws himself between a younger image of herself, and a foe clad in black.

Powerless to intervene, Maethoriel can do nothing but watch as that foe engages her father in battle, blades crashing together with such force she is astounded they do not shatter to pieces in an instant. Her father's apparent fury is a nearly palpable thing, but even that is no match for the cold precision his opponent favors, enabling him to advance all too quickly.

Yearning to call out a warning, but unable to do anything of the sort, Maethoriel observes, horror struck, as the foe parries yet another swing of her father's blade. As the force of that parry knocks the other man off-balance. And when all seems to be lost, she would be a fool to pretend she did not feel the chill of tears sliding down her cheeks while the enemy's blade slices clean through her father's chest, and he slumps to the ground, dead.

"Why—why have you done this?"

The words her shadow-likeness hurls at the foe reach her as though through a fog, and even still Maethoriel cannot quite break free of the image displayed before her, the knowledge that it cannot possibly be real in the immediate present at odds with something almost sickly within her mind that causes her to cling to it like some sort of shield. As though the sight of home, and her family, even in the midst of tragedy, is a thing she prizes above all else.

Entranced, even if some portion of her being is hardly aware of it, Maethoriel continues to watch as her shadow-likeness flings itself across the body of her father. Her breaths come in shaky gasps as she notices the great, heaving sobs that wrack frail shoulders. But although she expects the man who had slain her father to approach her likeness, and forcibly pull her to her feet, she finds that he is turning toward her, instead.

Turning toward her, with a face that is all too familiar.

"Adar?"

"You wanted this, Maethoriel. You are—this."

"I'm not. I—I'm not—" Maethoriel stammers, stumbling back as Adar stalks toward her, suddenly terrified of this apparition that seems so different from the man she knew. The man she had abandoned.

That man had once looked upon her with something not all that far from acceptance. Something that was akin to a meeting of kindred spirits, of those who knew every last facet of one another's beings, and still refused to look away.

By contrast, this likeness of that man is regarding her with a deadened gaze. With indifference. But yet again, despite knowing, in some way, that none of this can possibly be real, Maethoriel is powerless to find any way of breaking free.

Even when Adar's shadowy frame continues to press an advantage against her, granting him the ability to wrap a hand around her arm, and burning her skin with the contact.

"Come with me."

Frantically shaking her head, Maethoriel tries to break free of an iron grasp. She cries out when Adar's hold on her forearm tightens, suddenly able to feel her bones grinding together beneath her skin.

Though her awareness that the rest of him is hardly tangible is growing, bit by bit, the pain in her arm turns that into a reality that is fading rather quickly into the background. And as this wraithlike version of Adar continues to push her backward, Maethoriel once again finds her desire for this contact between them to be real at odds with the inherent horror that the situation implies.

Clearly, somewhere along the line, she has lost her mind…

"This is real, Maethoriel. This is your fate," The shadowy likeness of the man she had once been so very willing to give it all for persists, deadened eyes scanning her own features with an almost clinical level of precision that turns her stomach, "Accept it before I am required to make you do so."

Though she certainly did not believe it to be possible, Maethoriel finds that Adar's grip upon her arm grows impossibly tighter—more painful. The fire beneath his grasp is now an inferno, and she is all but certain her skin will bear the markings of that inferno for an age.

Even then, however, she is incapable of pulling away. She is not even certain that she would want to, if she could. And as horror threatens to consume her—as Adar pushes her until her back collides against the trunk of a tree, her head snapping against the bark, and causing her vision to darken at the corners—she knows.

The words he whispers as she fades into unconsciousness are nothing more than the truth.

"Without Sauron, you and I? We are nothing."

The next time that Maethoriel wakes, she is surrounded by the sticky feel of blood, and an unimaginable pain that seems all but determined to rend her from within.

The forest she'd been traveling in all but forgotten as another lightning bolt of pain ricochets through her, a scream tears its way past gritted teeth. Her body curls in on itself, seemingly without any sort of input from her conscious mind, at all.

It is then that she realizes she is resting upon a makeshift bed, of sorts. Or rather, a slab of unforgiving stone, covered in already-bloodied furs. And when the second spasm of pain comes, forcing her body to curl still further inward, Maethoriel simultaneously becomes aware of another presence standing just out of her line of sight.

"How fares her progress?"

The voice is cold. Detached. Curled in on herself as she is on the slab, Maethoriel is hardly stunned when the owner of that voice slowly steps into view. Beneath the weight of his discerning gaze, she can feel her skin starting to crawl.

Dimly, she is aware of another pair of hands at her back. Prodding. Assessing. But before she can make any move to recoil, another spasm of pain pulls her under its sway, and her teeth grind together to ward off another scream.

"She will be ready soon enough, my lord."

"Very well. Keep me informed as she labors."

"Yes, my lord."

The hands at her back withdraw, a shuffling sound indicative of the approach of the one who had been providing assurances to the man that is beginning to move away from her side bringing Maethoriel's gaze forward. Bringing her attention away from one she had quickly come to fear. Gazing upon the new face, she finds she cannot recognize it, though that hardly makes a difference given the vast number of orcs laboring beneath Sauron's command.

She would be a fool to pretend that she is not confused. That looking upon the face hovering before her, rather than at the desolation and emptiness of the forest where a part of her knows very well she should be is anything other than terrifying. That it hardly makes any sense.

Regardless of her own uncertainties, however, she finds herself looking into the eyes of the nameless orc standing before her. In the moment of relief between spasms that refuse to let up, she gets the sense that she is not alone. That somehow, in spite of the deference shown to the man that held the two of them in thrall, it is Maethoriel's side that the orc resides on, now.

The thought fills her with something not all that far from a sense of wonder, even if she can hardly begin to fathom why it is the case. And perhaps Sauron senses that, given the manner in which he seems to instinctively pause before departing from them entirely, his next words hushed, but no less threatening, as a result.

"You will ensure that the two of them survive. I will not tolerate failure. Not again."

Again, Maethoriel is left in no doubt that the words are intended to be a threat. She can feel that easily enough as their impact seems to imbed itself inside of the very room they inhabit. And although Sauron is now gone, as the next spasm of pain rips through her abdomen, and makes its way up her spine, she finds herself reaching on instinct for the hand of the orc at her side.

A hand that tightens infinitesimally around her own, the look the two of them share one of something akin to understanding before the orc is pulling away, once again returning to previous tasks while Maethoriel is left on her own to fight a battle against relentless pain.

A battle that she loses as another spasm approaches, and the edges of her vision begin to fade once more.

In the predawn chill, a man and his son move quietly through the underbrush, eyes trained carefully on their surroundings in hopes of tracking a deer.

Wrapped in layers to ward against the cold, their breath still puffs into clouds in the air that surrounds them, but the man's gloved fingers still retain their grip upon the bow held carefully at his side. A bow that had been given to him by his wife's father, mere months before the man had died.

It was that man who taught him how to hunt. How to glean a better living from the land, when all of his own attempts at doing so had clearly failed. And he will never be more grateful for that reality than when he looks at his son where he walks by his side.

"Will we find one, Papa? Will we find a deer?"

"If you keep quiet, we will," The man teases, reaching out to ruffle his son's hair, and then dropping that hand down to nudge at his boy's shoulder, instead, "Why don't you run ahead and check the snares?"

Smiling, his boy eagerly moves to do so, and the man watches after him for only a moment, before returning his attention to the task at hand. To the act of looking for tracks, or any sign of a larger animal's passing. He does not stray far from the sound of his son's movements, a wry smile tugging at the corners of his mouth at how they are at direct odds with everything he has tried to teach him, thus far.

He can remember his own father, all those years ago, absolutely furious with his own inability to remain silent, at times. His back still bears the scars from that anger, and he had resolved then and there to never do the same to his own blood.

The thought of how he had succeeded thus far in the venture fills him with the sort of comfort he had come to know since finding his wife. Since her family had taken him in as one of their own. And it is that thought that spurs him forward, until he catches sight of a disturbance in the leaves at the base of a nearby tree.

A disturbance, and a slight smear of what can only be blood against the bark.

Pressing his finger to the smear, he confirms that suspicion within seconds. Concern registers at the back of his mind, because the height would be far too much for a deer, or any other animal to be likely to reach.

Almost immediately, he turns to get eyes on his son once more, a desperate sort of fear seeping through his veins at the thought that they are clearly not alone. The imprint of a boot in the muck beneath the scattered leaves at the tree's base all but confirm it.

Already, he can picture numerous threats. All of the ways things might go wrong. But before he can venture too far down that particular path, he hears his son's voice, calling out to him from a short distance away.

"Papa! Papa, come and see!"

Ignoring the part of him that wonders at the wisdom of charging headlong through the foliage, when a threat could very well be near, the man hurries toward his son. He scans the boy as best he can while moving, in an effort to discern any injury or discomfort.

Finding none, the man is able to breathe again, albeit in short gasps, his entire body still on high alert for any form of attack. And when he finally comes to a halt at his son's side, he spends a moment casting his gaze around them, until he discovers that his boy's attention is fixed rather firmly upon the forest floor at their feet.

Upon the body of a woman, thin and pale, her sweat-dampened dark hair half-covering the clear puckering of a scar that spans from her temple, to just beneath the fine bone of her jaw.

"Is she dead?"

Unsure of the answer, himself, the man crouches down, extending one hand to push his son back a few steps, while the other hovers near the woman's nose, testing for breath. He is not blind to the weapons belted at her waist, and with such proximity, he takes note of a second scar starting on the side of her neck, and disappearing beneath the ragged fabric of her cloak.

It takes a moment, but he finally feels the faintest gusts of breath against his fingers, in time with the shallow rise and fall of the woman's chest. And as he looks up to meet his son's eyes, he can already predict what his boy is preparing to say.

"We have to help her."

Apprehension rolls through him again, this time in response to the idea of taking a stranger—even a woman—inside of his home. The idea of bringing her in close proximity to his son and his wife, when he has no way of knowing what she will do, once she wakes.

Again, his gaze trails back to the weapons she carries. To the scars she bears, and the thought of how on earth she might have earned them. After only a moment spent in thought, however, he reaches to pluck the knives from their sheaths, using the displaced leaves the woman had likely disturbed in her fall to conceal them. With one final look toward his son, the man hands the boy his bow. He scoops the woman into his arms.

Aware of the faint whimper that escapes her, he shifts to secure his hold. And although he spares one final glance back at where he has concealed her weapons, in an effort to recall where to find them later, the man soon turns his attention to getting her, and his son, back to their home.

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