Burnt Sugar by sallysavestheday

Burnt Sugar

They had eaten peaches until they were nearly drunk on the nectar, sticky at their lips and on their fingers, glistening on their chins and sliding down their wrists in amber droplets: the concentrated essence of their joy.

Andreth had speared the last of them on twigs and roasted them over the fire as the sun went down. The juices hissed in the flames and perfumed the rising smoke until there was no room in the darkness for anything but sweetness and her shining eyes.

When he kissed her, at last, her mouth was all sugar and char, smoky-rich and dizzying. Nothing would ever match the taste of her, bright and sweet and yielding in the honeyed night.

He holds that memory in his mind as the fires bear down.

Morgoth wants them to die in terror; he craves the scent of fear.

Aegnor will not give it to him. He opens his heart, remembering the peaches, and lets himself burn as he has ever burned for her: fiercely, purely, falling joyfully into the embrace of the sweetened flames.