Precious by Sasha Honeypalm

Chapter 1

         It had been in his hand when he'd fallen into the fire.

         It was not there now. When he had awoken in this strange place (you know where you are), it was gone, gone, gone. It was gone, stolen, wicked thieves had taken it. The emptiness of its absence ached like a hacked-off limb. To have it taken from him after its all-too-brief return was all but unbearable. But he would find it again. It was here somewhere, it must be. In the dreadful peace of these halls (you know) it would blaze, his own personal lodestone. He would find it. He would find it and be whole.

         The tapestries mocked him, his treasure’s image picked out in brilliant threads. They were utterly merciless, these pictures. They showed him in his innocent youth, a beautiful boy with no blood on his hands, and they showed him older, terrible, changed. A monster. The ruin of his life was bared on every wall, and he couldn’t help but remember—

         (you know what you did)

         Couldn’t remember—

         (murderer)

         Did. Not. Remember. There were tapestries lining the walls, but he never looked at them. Why would he look at them? He had no time to look at them.

         He didn't remember if he'd been in this corridor or not. Perhaps not. There was no end of them. There was no end to them. He walked and walked and wherewasit and walked—

          "Preciouss..."

          He froze at the sound.

         "My Preciouss." A thing crawled out from under a red-fringed hanging. It had a form similar to that of a child, but twisted, as if Morgoth had started breaking it into an Orc and then wandered off halfway through. "Where is it? Where did they takes it? Come back to us, Preciouss, we'll be very good. Precious will be safe with us, yes, safe in the dark, away from the nassty lights. Sweet as fishes it will be! We must finds it, must keep it safe..."

         A bone-white limb clawed at the air. "Where iss it? Gone, preciouss, gone! Gone and lost!" It sat on its haunches and wailed. "Lost, lost! We wants it back! We needs it! Precious!"

          The head swiveled around, and it seemed to see him for the first time. "Elves! Sss!" It scooted backwards. "You can't have it, it's ours!" It scuttled off down hallway, muttering. "Nassty, thieving Elveses— we hates them, we hates them! They follows us, preciouss, they wants to take it away, away for themselves. But we won't let them, gollum, we won't let them takes it. No, precious, it's ours, preciouss..."

         He watched the loathsome creature go, and to his surprise found his disgust was mingled with— was that pity? Yes, he could not help but pity the poor mad thing. He wondered what unhappy story it had wandered out of. The red-fringed tapestry showed the creature falling to its doom, its face warped in triumphant pain. Something felt familiar and it puzzled him; it was almost like waking up, like remembering—

         (you know)

         (you...)

         (no)

         He was standing in front of a tapestry. It showed a wizened figure (and why did it look familiar?) falling into flame, its expression one of agonized joy that it would not outlive the object of its heart’s desire. It was clutching a ring— a shiny ring, but not the shiny thing he was looking for. No, he knew what he searched for— his light in the Everlasting Darkness, his birthright, his solace, his—

         Precious.

          The word came swiftly to his mind, almost as if he had heard it recently (but that was ridiculous) (there was no one else here). He tried it out on his lips.

         "My precious," he whispered, and there was a rightness to it that made him want to weep.