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pursuitseternal · 1 year ago

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Spooky, sexy, wolfy “Trespassers Beware” just in time for Halloween…

Fem!Reader (Galadriel) x Sauron |E| 4K Wolf Sex

🎨 by @thebabydragon

Summary: You seek the source of the dark power, following the rumors and the wolf howls to the Old Fortress… he finds you… and does so much more

CW: bestiality, multiple wolves at once, wolf possession, disembodied sorcerers having their way, sex in an old ruin with your forbidden lover

Read on AO3 | Tolkien Masterlist

🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺🐺

You heard the rumors; they are what drive you to leave the secret realm you worked tirelessly to build. Your haven, your home among the trees. Your safety ensured for an age among the Mallorn trees, you enjoyed the peace while war had raged around you. Your powers of protection had ensured the preservation of light in the darkness.

But it wasn’t enough. Not since you had touched the darkness and left it with a howl in your ears and a slickness between your legs.

You tried to be content with your kingdom of light, but in the dark, you still heard his music. It wafted to you in your dreams, faint, an almost-illusion that haunted you. But it never woke you. Never appeared. Never showed himself aroused and ready to fuck as he had before. He was too preoccupied with war then, and since the Fall of the Enemy, that music had grown silent.

Until tonight.

Tonight, the melody stirred your body, boiling your blood. Tonight you crept along the forest darkness, the edge of your own lands behind you. You still remember that music from your dreams. The way you had just awoken in a sweat, wet and panting like you hadn’t felt in over and age.

You knew the rumors had spread to your door, a spirit dwelling in the shadows of the Old Fortress. Dol Guldur. You had heard tales from travelers that now there were foul things in the darkness, spider webs among the trees and howls in the silence.

But rumors were hollow. You need to see them for yourself. To follow the call of those wolves to their Master.

For you could not deny, part of you hopes it is him. The master of such wolves, the sensual caress of darkness itself.

Your heart beats in your chest, erratic and hard, as you step between the black limbed trees in this part of the Greenwood. Or the Mirkwood as it is now called. Craning your neck, you listen for his song, just a faint wavering that meets your ear.

Your hand flexes, the thin strip of your finger missing the protection of your ring. But you smile, better to seek what you desire without abandon, without distraction or more temptation. For finding the Spirit in the Woods is temptation enough.

Dusty, dead leaves under your feet turn to cold stones. You stand on the bridge to the Fortress, a chill in the air that somehow heats your body, shivers running down your spine to pool between your thighs. You hear that song, that music, faint but real, whining from the distant and crumbling walls. Mists swirl, and you get the feeling of distant eyes watching you, that crawling sensation creeping all across your skin to steal your breath. You reminisce, the feeling of being here before. The ruins of a fortress of darkness, howls in the distance, your body warming at the memory of the same feelings from a thousand years before.

The hush of winds rustle the leaves across the stone bridge, and you push on. Until you hear the scratch of claws in front of you. Suddenly, orange eyes begin to glow in the shadows of arches and derelict walls. Panting, growling, a pack of large, grey wolves file in around you. Their eyes glint in hunger, tongue lapping at their jaws.

Suddenly, a low, rumbling howl overwhelms your ears, commanding his pack to withdraw. Commanding you to come.

And come you do. The way his voice weaves around your body is palpable, shaking into your flesh, riding into your insides with a tremor.

You know that sound in your bones. It is him.

Above you from a parapet, black mist swirls. And then eyes large and red shine, flickering with ridges of orange and flecks of yellow. Made of flame themselves. Two of them, staring unblinking above you. Your blood seems to freeze with fear and boil with desire at once.

That music that settled for ages in your bones now greets your ear, melancholic, weak, and mournful. A baleful howl comes from that patch of shadow, darker than death itself.

“Have you come to taunt me, Lady Light?” his voice scratched inside your ear. “Come to show me the spoils of a lost war? Treasures I shall never plunder the same again?”

Your heart races against your ribs, feeling your body responding to the sound of his voice, the pull of that lamenting music now that fills your ears.

“You come seeking something… or else you would not be here…” those flaming eyes seem to be framed in a tall form, crouching low to the floor of the parapet above you. A shadow of a great wolf, remembering the form you have always craved between your legs.

You step closer, your body humming to life as it had not for centuries. Your body burns despite the cold mist and shadows, your heart beats with lust, not with fear. Even as a dozen eyes shine back at you from the crumbling fortress.

“I may no longer have true eyes to see, or a true tongue to pry your answer from your pretty, pouting lips, but I have my ways even now to make you keen and answer me…”

“Oh?” You dare, sliding your feet through itching dust, your core now turning to liquid, searing and strange, as you meet those eyes of flame with your own arrogant glance. “What would you do to force out my answer as to why I have come? Do you fear I have come to tame you, Wolf?” You toss your words with confidence, arrogance growing with each step you take. Drawn in willingly by his sorcery, his presence.

“Tame me?” he spits down at you, throwing the heat of his gaze in your direction. “No, you will find I am fire and shadow now, untamable, feral, and wild as the dark forest in which you foolishly trespassed…”

Your heart lurches at the meanings. “You mean…?”

“That’s correct, little She-elf, little enemy of mine. I have no form with which to fuck you now, if that was your desire.”

“That is not…”

His howl pierces your ear, splitting your hearing, deafening you with his power. Shadows grow around you, feeling pulled inside the crumbling walls of the Old Fortress. All is mist and shadow and flames and shining eyes.

You feel a hint of fear, heart racing as those wolf eyes begin to draw nearer to you. They shine a white in the distance, but as they draw nearer, they glow like fire. Matching the eyes that still glare unblinking from the archway above you. “Do not lie to me, after all our times together, with only you and me, my fangs in your throat, your body trembling around mine. There is nothing else for it now, it is the punishment you will take for entering my lands. Pleasure or death.”

The black bodies of the wolves draw near, the Wolf Lord’s voice echoing around you from every direction. They circle you, brushing their fur against your legs every so often. Their growls make their own sad music, but one that still fueled the heat between your legs. Each wolf, sable coated and flaming eyes now. Like their Master.

“Which is it, my love,” his voice sounds in your ear, as if his mouth pressed into the curves and point of your ear. “Death—” you feel a snout shoving in your ass, the weight of the beast heaving against you until you fall to your knees. Pain shoots through your body as you hit the rough stone ruin. You pant, swallowing the cry of anguish. Another wolf, eyes of glowing orange and swirling gold, stares into you. Your face matching his height, his maw bearing teeth on one side, as if he smirks. “—or pleasure?” That disembodied voice floats no longer, the smell of smoke settling over this lupine form, that rumbling voice of the Master sounding from its throat.

“You know my answer,” you breathe with a force you did not suspect you could muster as you are stared down by two dozen flaming eyes in the darkness.

“Pleasure it is,” the voice rumbles, so close to the wolf, you can feel its low vibration in your belly. The beast’s hot breath passes over your face, its tongue lolling as it stares, smiling. Massive. You know that wolf will cover you head to toe once the master decides it.

But you force a laugh, reaching a hand to pet it between the ears, trialing your touch down its neck. Fur so thick, so lush, you can’t let go. “Of course, you pick the male almost as big and beautiful as you were to possess…”

“You’re wrong,” his voice sounds from the chest before you. And a dozen other places in the dark. “Why inhabit one body to fuck you in when I can possess them all… possess them to possess you…”

The air grows so cold around you, chilling your skin even under your shift. As if you are already naked. The damp of the mist thickens now, wetting your dress against the goose flesh of your body. You cannot bear it anymore. Ready to rip it off your self.

The Wolf before you takes a deep breath, nostrils flaring as he prods his muzzle into the neckline of your gown. For a moment, you enjoy the heat of his breath down your bosoms. The beast looks down at you with glowing orange eyes—his eyes. His teeth sink into the fabric of your dress, slowly and deliberately. Undressing you with care. Even if it means tearing the measly fabric from your flesh, rip by rip. He jerks his head, baring your skin to the damp night until it puddles in shreds at your feet.

You look at the beast before you, covered in thick, dark fur that ripples in the stiff breeze. And you want nothing more than to have it cover you head to toe. You wrap your arms around his neck, feeling its breath down your back, its muscles flexing in your embrace. The scent of cedar and smoke, the tingle of magic floods you where you touch him. That mournful flow of music curls inside your ear, the wolf resting his head on your shoulders for a moment.

But you are wrong to trust him entirely. His head lifts, dragging that soft, tickling fur against the crook of your neck. His laughter fills your ear, warm and harsh and cruel. Wet fangs replace the blanket of fur on your skin, their points sinking into the flesh of your shoulder with piercing agony. You scream, your voice swallowed by the noise, joining in the rising chorus of howls that echo around you.

Swallowed by the sound of him in his pack of monsters. Consumed by the pain of his fangs pressing into your flesh. Marking you, claiming you as his as your blood covers his tongue and paints his maw.

Your body buckles, bending you on your knees until your bare body lays on the freezing stone. Releasing your shoulder, the great wolf laps at the wounds, cleaning the punctures as soons as your blood begins to trickle. You shiver, from pain and from the cold, but soon it is only your biting fear that races up and down your spine.

Two more wolves approach you, their eyes glowing, his laughter multiplied as many voices when they reach their mouths for your wrists. They don’t bite. At least not hard. But they make you their captive, tongues licking the inside of your wrists as they stretch you out against the ground. Their teeth circled your wrists leaving you nowhere to go.

You breathe, forcing your chest to rise and fall. Feeling your nipples straining painfully hard in the cold. You wish something, anything would take away the chill.

As if to answer your desperate prayer, something hot trails over your mound. All you see is the hulking frame of that Great Wolf, eyes gleaming up from between your legs. “This wolf is strong, hungry,” your lover’s voice caresses inside your mind, as if stoking your desire from within. “A most worthy alpha to use for what I have waited centuries to do to you once more.” His laugh spikes a new sort of shiver down your spine as the animal chuffs and sniffs your folds. “You better beg me to stay in control of this monster…”

“You wouldn’t for one second relinquish control to another,” you snap in return, “no I trust you to be in complete control to enjoy this perverted union.”

“Thousands of years and you finally have learned your fate,” his words brushed like a loving caress. “None shall have you as I have, not in this world or the next….”

His words soften as you feel the cold press of a snout between you folds. Hot and cold mingle in one delicious mix, making your every nerve light on fire. Hot breath, chilled nose. Hot tongues and saliva between your legs and around your wrists as you lay on the freezing ground. An offering to the Wolf Lord himself.

Suddenly you feel heated mouths panting on you. A tongue slips between your folds, lapping and licking with ferocity. A hunger barely bridled. But you can see nothing but black fur now wreathing your vision. More beasts descend upon you, eyes glowing. All under his influence.

“If I must only take what is mine through these wolves, I might as well make use of them all.” His voice tickles in both your ears, sounding from between your thighs, echoing inside your very mind. “And I will use them all at once, in case you doubt my power…”

Maws lower to both your pointed nipples, coating both in matching swirls of wolf-tongues. Your body floods, unable to handle the contact on your skin. The heat and the wet saliva that trickles from your cunt, slipping down the side of your body as all three mouths make sloppy work of your pleasure. A graze of teeth against one nipple sends a scream from your lips, you try to lift your hands, but more fangs press softly into your wrists.

And then you hear that low, throated laugh shiver through your body and mind again.

“Why such a hurry?” he chuckles. “I am starved since last we coupled, as are you from the smell of you. Be still, Princess, my tongues will do you some good.”

You feel consumed, your flesh at his mercy, your pleasure raging unbearable and hot. Everything about you is dripping, your folds leak your arousal faster than the beast’s tongue can lap it up. Your own mouth salivates, and your ears are filled with the wet squelch. Every sense of your body is consumed by heat and flame, going rigid as you writhe on the ground.

For a moment, they all withdraw. For a moment, you feel only cold and wet from their drool and your own cum as it cools in the night breeze. But your guardians hold you firm, binding your wrists in their maws. No escape. But you wouldn’t dream of it now, not as you rub your legs together, unfulfilled and empty. Mewls scratch and whine from your throat, your thighs drenched even as you try to chase the need for him inside you. The walls of your pussy clench on nothing, as your voice cries out only more and more desperate.

And he laughs. A laugh so low, so much like a growl, it shakes your bones. “Are you afraid, little princess? Afraid I’ll leave you for the wolves, or afraid you’ll leave here empty and aching with no cum to drip down your thighs?”

“Both,” you manage to pant, a small thrill of that fear and a massive rush of anticipation as something massive pushes its rippling, fur-coated body between your squirming legs.

“Then let me give you the means of mastering your fear, Princess,” his voice seems to tickle your ears, air brushing past them both as if lips hung not a breath away.

Thick, smooth, and wide…. You are filled, the walls of your innards stretch to the limit. You scream as his cock presses so deep, slipping effortlessly from your slick. Eyes flash down between your legs, seeing nothing but the black of his underbelly and the way your belly swells and bumps. So filled. So aching. He trusts again and again, that rise of him in your cunt protruding over and over. Your hips buck to take him deeper. Beastly breath pants over your head, stands of drool from his slacked maw trickle between your breasts.

And still he thrusts. Your eyes fixed on the bulge of your gut, the way you could take him inside you more and more if your little body could manage it. Pain and pleasure swirl down every nerve, you have never felt more alive, nor more in danger as a dozen eyes glow and a dozen tongues lap their jaws as if they wait for their turn.

His voice growls in your ear, inside your head, a little rumble with each body-splitting thrust he made between your thighs. “Take me,” he rasps in your mind. You feel his tongue lapping at your shoulder, cleaning the blood that begins to run fresh from the rigor of his fucking. Raising your legs, you brace your thighs around his middle and you buck your hips to make him slide deeper. Slam after slam against the end of your cunt. Vision starts to fade until the last thing you see are two glowing eyes of fire in your face, a pink tongue cleaning your crimson blood off its shining teeth.

Then all goes white, your body erupting fire that spasms down your nerves and burns your veins. You stop breathing, the sound of your own scream is swallowed as his tongue laps in your mouth, down your throat. You are suffocating in his rut, possessed just as much as these wolves that pant their lust.

Suddenly, you feel more tongues lapping your body again as the ground of the Old Fortress steadies beneath you. They lick every inch of you, making you squirm and writhe, fighting against the jaws that keep you pinned. You can feel those guards clamp down, their fangs piercing your skin.

The scent of blood thickens.

The sounds of growls and the caws of the carrion birds crescendo. Only sound greater is the way his laugh sounds impossibly loud and impossibly deep in tone. Like gathering thunder.

The thrusts between your legs make your whole cunt numb, the end of your channel unfeeling after he begins to fuck you even harder. More erratic. More feral and wild. You squeeze your thighs harder, trying to leverage against his hip bones, but he only shifts himself against you so rough, you feel the fur of his balls tickling your ass.

Once… twice… you scream despite the lapping, ravenous tongue in your mouth. And then you feel split apart, his knot shoving into your entrance, hard and swollen and bursting. You feel him filling you, pump after pump of cum coating you, overfilling past his cock to squirt from you. The heat that liquid warms your skin as it pools beneath you, and you shiver in the chilling air.

You tremble, wet from their drool, from your blood at your wrists and your shoulder. Sticky and slick even as you wait for his knot to release you. And yet all you can hear are the piercing, chilling cries of carrion birds. Their voices harbingers of death.

“Release me,” you breathe, trembling in voice as your body is wracked with another shiver. “You have given me my fill of pleasure, and I have seen you haven’t lost any of your power…”

“Or my desire,” he rasps in your ear. Another low, consuming howl sounds from the sky, and all the wolves withdraw. That cock tugging free from your folds roughly and suddenly. Your body feels broken, bereft, and cold. Not empty, not as you feel the still heated drips of cum seeping from you. “Join me,” his voice swirls from ear to ear, as if his body hovers over yours on the broken stones of Dol Guldur.

“No,” you pant, trying to lift your body from the ground. But something keeps you pinned still, black mist warm on your skin as you realize it is him around you. On top of you.

“You think you have a choice… how amusing,” you feel a tickle over your collarbone, the black mass taking on a strange orange glow within. “Your arrogance to come to me, to trespass on my domain, has only left you bound to the one being you crave and despise in equal measure.”

You fight to get to your hands and knees, trying to push off the dirt and cum covered stones. Something brushes against your sex as you crawl, as if a cold, damp breath breathes you in. “You can leave, Princess, but you will always be drawn back to me…”

You grit your teeth fighting harder to stand. First one foot, then the other as you crouch beneath the weight of his enchantment. It feels so good, so thrilling, to push back against him for once.

“… you have and will always long for more, another belly swollen with my seed, another empty void filled inside you…”

You press yourself to standing, lifting your head even as the black mist swirls, darts and flickers of orange flames sparking in the midst of it.

“…for you know you are what you have always been…”

“Your mate,” you breathe, “but I will not remain in this chaos and darkness.”

You feel the chill of the air warm at your words. Your admission. The flashes of orange begin to cluster, to take a form, the shape of a man. A smile crosses your lips, feeling the warmth of his magic stealing over your skin, battling the cold that sends goose flesh across your body.

“Then join me…” you feel his voice flutter against your skin, so close and yet unattainable. Intangible.

“You know my answer…” you reply, forcing your words even as that mist trails hotly over your flesh, warming at your nipples, caressing the back of your neck.

You hear him sigh down your skin. “If only I could take true form… if only I could really touch you, convince you…”

“You will have to settle for haunting me, it seems,” you sigh, arching your back as his invisible attentions continue, sending another flood of arousal between your already drenched legs.

“It is you who have haunted me,” his breath, his presence tastes like smoke over your tongue as you gasp. As something prods at your belly and grips your ass. “The least I might do is return the favor, if I can’t keep you as my own, my possession.”

“I fear you will possess me for ages to come,” you wriggle from the center of the black mass, and he lets you. And even as you walk down the cracked path and crumbling bridge of the Old Fortress, you can feel the heat of those glowing eyes on your back. You still feel the slick sliding across your bare thighs as you walk in the darkness.

And all the while, you hum that mystical melody. His song. The melody still clings to your year and fills your throat. You can’t stop, even if you tried, possessed entirely by him. In mind, if not in body. At least not until the next time he calls to you.

One last entry for @hellghoulweek and @thehaladrielfancollective (I’m sure there are five kinks on there for Kinktober 🪦🐺)

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saurongorthaur9 · 3 months ago

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The Truth That Binds

Rating: M

Summary: As Halbrand heals from his wound, he and Galadriel grow closer, and Galadriel makes a confession of hope that turns into one of love. But Halbrand insists that Galadriel make him a promise: a promise to remember a truth that will bind her for all time. My first Haladriel/Saurondriel fic!

Also available to read on AO3

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The light that danced on the Glanduin that morning was a silver brighter than burnished elven steel, the trees across the river were a display of every shade of green, and the lupins that grew along the path were the most beautiful purples and blues, an ocean of color that wrapped around Galadriel from every side. The air from the west was wholesome and fresh, and despite the new whispers of war from the south, Galadriel felt a deeper peace than she had known for a thousand years. And her heart told her that she owed that newfound peace to the man walking companionably by her side.

Halbrand had been instructed by his healers to take a daily walk along the banks of the Glanduin to regain his strength after his close brush with death. Already, the deathly pallor that had clung to his cheeks during their ride to Eregion had retreated, the red-brown luster of his hair had returned, and he stood straight and tall once again. Galadriel attested his swift recovery from the terrible wound to the strength and nobility of his will, yet more proof that he truly was a king of Men.

She glanced at him, her eyes fondly tracing the profile that she had grown to know so well in these past months since their chance meeting upon the sea. Most mornings she accompanied him on his walk, having little else to do while awaiting the High King's arrival, and though she and Halbrand rarely spoke on those occasions, it did not seem to Galadriel that they needed to. Never before had she met another being whose very soul seemed to be so attuned to hers. Ever since the battle and that quiet moment afterwards beside him in the forest, she felt somehow bound to him in a way she could not yet name, and new thoughts and feelings stirred deep inside her every time their eyes met, filling all her being – body and soul – with licking flames. Yet, even so, she could not help but notice that for the last several days, Halbrand's thoughts seemed to be turned elsewhere, to concerns veiled from her mind, yet she could guess that his thoughts strayed to his people in the south, homeless and adrift, and the orcs filling the land that he should be ruling.

They reached a point in the trail where the path wove into a shaded glen. It was quiet and isolated, hidden by the ring of linden and beech trees from the tall towers of the city. In the middle of the grove was an elegant wooden bench, surrounded by the sweet-smelling lupins. It had become a wordless custom between them to linger a while here, watching the river flow lazily by as they basked in one another's company.

For a while they became lost in the companionable silence, surrounded by the murmur of wind in the trees all around and the soft lap of water along the bank. But then Halbrand breathed a deep sigh. "It truly is beautiful here," he murmured.

Galadriel looked at him. There was awe in his gaze, but also a longing, and beneath that, something akin to hunger that flickered deep in his green eyes. She looked around at the aestival loveliness of their surroundings, and her mouth twisted slightly. "You should see Lindon," she replied in the same quiet tone that he had used.

He shot her a look, eyebrow raised. "Is that an invitation, Galadriel?" he asked, and there was a note of a familiar teasing tone in his voice that made warmth rise in Galadriel's chest.

Her own gaze was steady and serious. "No," she said. "But with the new threat of Adar and the orcs in the south, it may be that my High King will wish to ally himself with the King of the Southlands. In that case, you may very well see the heart of elvendom in Middle-earth."

"I think I should like that," he answered, his voice distant.

"To see my family's home or to ally your people to mine?" she asked.

He didn't answer, but he gazed across the river silently, his body strangely still.

Galadriel followed his gaze out across the water. "You worry for your people, do you not?" she said softly. "Now that your wound is healing and your body grows strong again, you will leave Eregion and return to them soon." As she said the words, she felt the heaviness of them and the shortness of time sink into her heart. She had known that such must come to pass and that the day that their paths finally diverged could not be staved off forever. Her soul felt full of a thousand thoughts and emotions that she could not bring herself to admit. Yet, the silence between them screamed at her to say something.

"Halbrand," she said quietly.

He turned his eyes to her, the intensity of his full gaze settling on her face.

"Halbrand," she said again, and his name on her lips felt like a prayer. "I do not truly think you know all that you have done for me."

His lips twisted into that familiar wry smile. "I'm the one with a crown and a people again because of you," he said.

"Yes," she acknowledged solemnly, "but you have given me just as much." Her eyes wandered across the river once again, to the swaying trees on the distant bank. "For a thousand years, I had been driven by naught but by a desire for vengeance and a creeping dread that freezes the very heart. But hope? Hope was something I believed had died inside me with my brother and my cousins and all else whom I lost in the War." Her fingers wound around the dagger hilt at her belt, the touch of it more familiar than anything else in her world. "Deep down, I do not know if I truly wished to find Sauron and finally end his evil, for if I did, what else would I have to live for? My vengeance would be put to rest, and then there would be nothing."

She could feel his gaze on her, and she turned back to him. "I cannot explain it, but your presence has filled a gaping hole in my soul that I did not know could ever be mended." She stuttered, aware of how vulnerable and intimate were the words she spoke, but it was as if a fire were lit now in her heart and she could not let it burn out or a part of her would wither. "Halbrand, when I leapt from that ship, I do not know what it was I sought. But I found in you that which I did not think to seek: purpose, and with it again…hope."

Her fingers sought his and grasped his hand. The burning inside her was growing, and she needed him to understand. "For a millennia, all that my heart sought was death and destruction – of evil, yes, but death and destruction still. I needed to know that I had more left to me than seeking to destroy, that I could also seek to build and to grow and to mend." She felt tears forming upon her lashes, threatening to spill down her narrow cheeks. "I needed to know that I could seek life beyond my endless quest for death." She squeezed his hand. "You gave me that, Halbrand, and it shall ever be in my heart, whether you are at my side or on a distant shore of Middle-earth."

She felt as if she were sinking into his eyes, and through his eyes into the depths of his being. She brought up her hand and gently stroked her fingertips over the rough stubble of his cheeks and let them brush through the edges of his brown locks. Her other hand trembled in his.

He lifted his own hand, mirroring her, and she felt his calloused blacksmith fingers brushing along her cheekbones and slipping deep into her hair. His gaze remained locked with hers, the intensity of their stares perfectly matched.

The heat had settled deep in Galadriel's stomach, burning, burning. As if of their own accord, her eyes darted momentarily down to the curve of his lips then back up to his eyes. As brief as the moment was, however, Halbrand saw. "Galadriel," he said softly, and there was something like a quiet warning in his voice.

Somehow, their bodies had drawn closer, she did not know how. But now they sat so close together that her leg was all but brushing his and their still-joined hands rested in the minute gap between their hips.

For a moment, doubt seized her, thoughts of duties and her place among elvenkind and the distance that would soon separate her and the King of the Southlands. But she was Galadriel, daughter of the golden house of Finarfin, and it was not for others to decide how she wove her own fate. She leaned forward.

To her surprise, Halbrand stopped her.

"Galadriel," he said again, her name both a reverence and a warning. "Are you sure you want this?"

She tilted her chin proudly, her voice strong again. "I have walked Middle-earth since the first sunrise," she said, "and in that time, I have pursued that which I desired and let no Man or Elf stop me."

There it was again: that wry smile that danced at the corners of his lips and formed soft crow's feet at the corners of his eyes. "That is something to which I can readily attest," he answered. "Even when I first saw you upon that raft, I knew you were someone who chose her own path." His eyes grew briefly distant, lost to either thought or memory, but when they focused on her again, they burned with a new intensity. His fingers tightened in her hand.

"Galadriel," he said. "Tell me, do you love me?"

Her gaze did not waver and her chin remained tilted, confident and strong. "Yes," she answered simply.

His lips tightened, but she could not tell what emotion it was that danced behind the light of his eyes. "Do you love me, Galadriel? Not the King of the Southlands. Not the blacksmith of Númenor. Not the man who saved your life? But me? Do you truly love who I am?"

She could tell the question was intensely important to him, that it touched something that gnawed at the very core of his soul. She cupped his cheek, re-teaching her fingers how to be tender after fighting for so long. "Yes, Halbrand, I love you," she answered. "Not for your armies and your kingdoms, not for any debt owed, but for you."

He reached up and took her hand from his face and held both her hands tightly in his lap. His stare seemed to be boring a hole straight through her to her soul. "Can you promise me something, Galadriel?" he asked. "I need you to make me a promise."

For a moment, Galadriel hesitated, knowing with intimate pain the price that could come with an oath. Yet her resolve hardened at the strange agony she saw on his face as he waited for her answer. "What is it that you would have me promise?"

He kept hold of her hands tightly. "I ask only that you promise to remember this moment and what I am about to tell you." He adjusted himself on the bench to face her entirely, his leg pressing flush against hers. "There may come a day when you doubt what I am about to say, when you wonder if I told you the truth. And I tell you, Galadriel, this is the truth. Whatever else you may come to believe, remember that in this moment, I told you the truth."

His fingers seemed to burn against her skin, even as his eyes seemed to burn against her face. "Galadriel, whatever else you may ever believe about me, whatever else about me you may someday learn, I need you to know that I have not been false with you. This, Galadriel, this…" He lifted her hand and placed it against his chest over his heart. "…this is real. This is who I am, truly me. I have worn no mask in your presence. I need you to promise me that you will always remember that I told you this and that it was the truth."

She did not understand, but she understood that this promise was more important to him than anything he had ever asked of her before. She spread her fingers over his heart. "I promise," she said steadily. "I promise to remember for all time, Halbrand."

Finally, he relaxed, and his fingers around her hand were gentle once again. His shoulders eased, as if a great weight had suddenly fallen from them. For a moment, Galadriel thought she felt something brush against her mind, like a fellow powerful will, but she dismissed it as a part of her own complicated thoughts, for only her people and powers higher than they could touch minds in such a manner.

"Are you content?" she asked.

"Yes," he sighed. "Yes, I am content."

"Then shall I pursue what I desire?"

The smirk that crossed his lips this time was playful and mischievous, and his eyes glimmered.

Galadriel reach up and twined her fingers through his hair, and then she pressed her lips to his.

It was as if colors that she had never before conceived of burst into being and sensations of which she had never dreamed were birthed inside of her, light and time and darkness across eons converging upon one another in this one moment and place. Galadriel kissed him with the fire of the Noldor and the pain of the last three thousand years and the hope that he had brought back into her life. Inside her and all around her, a Song seemed to rise and reverberate, as if the Great Music at the heart of all existence was blossoming into life.

For a moment, Halbrand's lips were still against hers, almost as though he couldn't believe the kiss was real, but then with a surge of passion and fierce hunger, he lifted his hands to bury them deep in her hair on either side of her face, and at the same time kissed her back with ravening desire. He kissed her as if he were lost in the shadows of the deepest caves in the heart of the Hithaeglir and she was the only light that could guide him back home. He kissed her as if he were a starving man and she the only feast that could sate him. He kissed her as if this were his one and only chance and he might never touch her again.

His stubble tickled pleasantly against her cheeks, but his lips were soft and clever against hers. His fingers carded deeply through her hair, and she shivered with involuntary pleasure as they stroked along the sensitive curve and taper of her pointed ears. At the same time, his lips parted, needing more than a superficial touch, and she felt the silky glide of his tongue over her lower lip as a reverberation that trembled all the way down to her core.

Her own response was immediate. She seized a handful of his hair and pulled him flush against her, parting her own lips in both an invitation and a claim, twining her tongue around his. Momentarily, he seemed caught off guard by her boldness, but then she felt his lips twist against hers into a smirk and he was kissing her back with the exact same abandon, refusing to let her throw him off.

There was too much distance between them, still too much. They were turned towards each other on the bench, their legs brushing together, but it was not enough. Skillful and graceful as any move she might have made on the battlefield, she kept her lips crushed against his as she pushed herself up and pivoted in a single movement, landing squarely in his lap, with her knees pressed against his hips on either side. He grunted in brief surprise, which made her smile, but then he was back to ravaging her with his mouth. His right hand remained buried in her long golden hair, cupping her cheek, but his other hand began to explore down her lithe form, gliding over her shoulders, then down her back, and finally over the swell of her hips and backside, where it settled, warm and firm, holding her body to himself.

She pressed her chest to him, leaning fully against him, and wrapped one arm about his broad shoulders. Her other hand explored every texture and feature of the face she had come to know so well by sight, seeking to memorize every line and angle. His tangled hair tickled against the back of her knuckles. He smelled of blacksmith iron and sweet wood smoke and the herbal ointments that the healers had used on his broken body. She remembered sitting next to him during those harrowing first few nights in Eregion, when it had been unclear if the souring of his wound ran too deep even for elvish medicine. She remembered further back to the days spent riding from the ruined Southlands and those long dark nights when she had forced both herself and the two steeds past the point normal endurance, terrified that if she stopped for even the briefest respite that Halbrand's life would be the cost, a price for which she would never forgive herself. She remembered how each stride of her horse's gallop had reverberated with the pounding of her heart when she had looked back on the final stretch of the ride to see Halbrand slumped motionless over his saddle and her devastating fear that she had lost this man with his charming smirk and his enigmatic eyes just when she was beginning to realize how much he meant to her.

But she had not lost him. They had survived, both of them, through the storm on the raft and through the battle against the orcs and through the torment of the fire mountain and through the fear and pain of their long ride to Eregion. He was safe, and he was hers at last.

As if his mind were at one with hers, he rose suddenly, lips still passionately pressed to hers, holding her slender body easily in his arms. She felt him stepping forward then bending, and the next thing she knew, he was laying her down in the fragrant grass and he himself was bent over her, his arms planted on either side of her head and his knees at her hips. Finally, he pulled his lips from hers in a slow, tantalizing caress and stared down at her, awe and lust mingling in his green eyes at the sight of her laid out beneath him with her shining golden hair pooled about her in the lush green grass. She stared up at him, undaunted but utterly mesmerized by the rugged, handsome king blocking out the sunlight from her view and casting her in shadows upon the ground.

"Galadriel," he whispered, as one might say the names of the Valar.

She cupped his cheek tenderly. "My king," she whispered back. "Oh, Halbrand."

He dipped forward to pull a long, lingering kiss from her lips, which sent shivers of liquid pleasure dancing down Galadriel's body. But now his hands were busy about her waist, loosening her belt and the elven silks in which she was draped. Heat steadily rose in Galadriel's chest, her breathing quickening rapidly. Her own fingers darted to his waist, undoing the leather belt clasped about his trim middle. She tugged at the bothersome fabric of his tunic, fingers desperate for skin, and he shrugged fluidly, helping her to free himself of the garment which he discarded on the grass beside them, leaving his broad chest bare.

Galadriel gazed up at him in ardent fascination then reached out a hand to place her palm flat against his chest. Thick coarse hair scratched against her skin. His breathing was quick, and she could feel his heart pulsing wildly.

But then he was bending over her again, and she felt her belt slip free under his fingers. In a moment of pure instinct, her hand darted out to stop him, and they froze, both their hands resting over the hilt of her brother's dagger.

She stared up wide-eyed into his face, frozen with sudden dread, and he stared down at her, still and quiet while he waited for her to face that dread. Her lips trembled. But then she slowly drew her hand away, giving him silent permission to continue.

Softly and almost reverently, he slipped the belt off her body and laid it, with the dagger, gently on top of his tunic. Just as gently, he ran his fingertips down her arm in a soft reassurance that made her heart tremble. But then his lips parted and just like that his passion was back, and he was tugging at the dress encasing her body. Eagerly, he pulled it off of her, allowing it to join his tunic in the grass, and leaving her utterly unclothed to his gaze.

The touch of the grass and wind and the sunlight felt strange against her naked flesh, but a sense of calm and peace wrapped all around her. Everything about this moment – both the laying aside of her dagger and her nakedness in that serene glen – felt so right, pieces of a puzzle coming together that she had waited years to find. She felt no fear or shame, only the intense burning in her core of how right this moment felt, of how right he felt.

His gaze said it all. He stared at her as if he could devour her with his eyes, his gaze sweeping down her entire body with reverence and hunger, from her white shoulders and breasts down to the bare curve of her hips and thighs and the golden curls between her legs. There was no need for him to speak, for his eyes said everything, and Galadriel reveled in the glory of her king's worshipful gaze.

With a quick, almost desperate movement, he freed himself of his trousers then stretched his own lean naked body over hers.

She gasped heavily at the sudden sensation of all of him, his heat and his weight, pressed down upon her own body. But he gave her no time to consider everything that was happening, for his lips descended upon her again, this time pressing everywhere he could reach. She arched her back, baring her throat, as his mouth found her pulse, first sucking with his lips, then scraping gently with his teeth, then laving with the flat of his tongue, drawing soft keening sounds from her lips. Her core pulsed and burned. Every inch of her yearned for him.

Down his lips strayed, and she wrapped her arm tight around his shoulder, caressing the lines of his muscles on his powerful back. Her other hand tangled in his hair, keeping his face pressed to her skin and silently encouraging his worshipful attention. He kissed along her shoulder, then along her collarbone, his hands dancing as skillfully along her body as she had seen him handle steel in the Númenorean forge. He shaped her pleasure just as expertly as he had shaped the armor she wore into battle. Her heart was pounding so hard that she knew he must be able to feel it.

He hand glided back up to her ribs where he cupped her breast easily, squeezing gently. His palm felt so large over her soft flesh, and she trembled all over, another soft sound escaping her that turned into a helpless whine as his clever fingers began to toy with her hardened nipple. He rolled the sensitive rosy nub between his thumb and forefingers, drawing out sensations that spiked all the way through Galadriel's body. Her back instinctively arched further, pressing herself into his hand, and his other palm slipped beneath her, resting against the exposed small of her back to support her frame.

Without warning, he lowered his mouth to her other breast, sucking her nipple in between his lips suddenly and causing her to gasp and squirm beneath him. His tongue played with her, causing her to whine and rub her thighs together with the building need. And then, curse his impudence, she felt the smirk of his lips against her breast and she knew he was pleased at the reaction he was dragging out of her. Well, if that was the way her roguish king was going to play…

He nearly choked as her own slender fingers grasped him firmly between his legs, and now it was her turn to smirk at the truly delightful whimper that he released into the world. His head fell back, his eyelids drooping languidly, his mouth hanging open, the long line of his throat exposed. As she began to stroke him, his fingers knotted tightly in the grass at her side and his body convulsed beautifully above her with pleasure.

Then his eyes snapped back open, piercing down upon her suddenly and fiercely. For a moment, it seemed that a light came on behind the veneer of his eyes, a flame as bright and consuming as the fire mountain that had devastated his Southlands. His hands grasped her hips and their eyes locked. The very air around them seemed to take a deep, shuddering breath of anticipation.

Galadriel's head fell back, hair spilling wildly around her, as Halbrand joined their bodies together as one. All around, it seemed there was a rainbow of light, more brilliant and beautiful than anything she had ever seen. Time and the expanse of Eä itself wheeled around them, but they were untouched by it, lost in their own universe where two bodies moved together in perfect harmony and two souls clung to each other for understanding that only the other could give. Their lips met again, and they kissed and wept crystal tears that mingled on each other's cheeks, and when Galadriel's pleasure crested and crashed about her, she grasped wildly at his shoulders and cried out his name, and when he followed her shortly after, he buried his face in the golden pool of her hair and panted raggedly as their heartbeats gradually slowed against one another's breasts.

Afterwards, he wrapped her in his arms and tugged her gently to his own body, and she rested her head on his chest as soft warmth and contentment and a peace like nothing she had ever known settled all around her like a blanket woven of down. The circle of blue sky above them and the ring of trees sang with the Music of which the world was made. Halbrand hummed deep in his throat, a strange tune that Galadriel assumed must be some song of the Southlands but at the same time, it was oddly familiar to her, as if she had heard it sometime in her distant past. Her hand gently stroked the ragged red scar on his side, and she thanked whatever fate it had been that brought them together on that raft all those months ago.

~o~o~o~

Less than a month later, Galadriel confronted Halbrand with a scroll of lineage in her hand, only a little ways down the bank from the place where they had joined body and soul, and she saw his familiar warm eyes turn cold and ancient and terrible. There, he offered to make her his queen for all time, and she had placed her dagger against his throat and refused him, even as it tore her soul in half to do so.

And there, on the bank of the Glanduin, only a few days later, she came across the glade of fragrant lupins where her abhorred enemy had laid her down so tenderly in the grass and given all of himself to her, even as he had also taken everything from her. She fell to her knees there in the grass, wrapping her arms about herself, and sobbed until her throat was ragged and no more tears would come.

She wept from the pain of betrayal and horror, she wept for the loss of her dear friend and companion, she wept for the knowledge that never again would she feel the peace and the understanding that she had only known in his presence, and she wept from the part of her that now yearned for him with an aching need that could never again be sated. All around her, the sunlight on the water and the shadowing trees and the lupins seemed to have lost all their luster, plunging her into a world wrapped only in hues of grey.

And there, in the grey and the silence, she remembered his voice and his fingers in her hair and the promise he had made her swear to him: that she would remember the truth he had told her, that the man she had loved had been real. It was that knowledge that pained her more than anything else and dragged from her the most bitter tears. It was the truth that would bind her in sorrow and shame and pain until the last days of her elven years were finally spent.

It was the truth that she had looked directly into the soul of her greatest Enemy and desperately loved what she found there.

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