Rʜʏᴍᴇ ᴛᴏ Rᴜɪɴ, Sᴏɴɢ ᴛᴏ Dᴜsᴛ

[naragukil]

Sᴛᴇᴇʟ ᴛᴏ Bᴏɴᴇ, Sᴋɪɴ ᴛᴏ Rᴜsᴛ -- ;

[naragukil]

iluveatar‌: 

   beyond  the  breathing  planet ,  beyond  stars  &  meteors ,  dust  &  gasoline  there  was  void.   endless ,  dark ,  merciless ,  terrible  but  home  of  both  death  and  life.   there ,  in  the  dark  there  was  light ,  that  no  words  can  describe.   light ,  full  with  all  others.   the  timeless  halls ,  a  silent  home  of  ainur ,  the  crown  of  the  universe ,  where  no  power  was  strong  enough  to  contradict  to  the  power  of  eternity.   a  path  of  marble ,  columns  of  limpid  crystal  but  walls  made  of  the  cosmos  itself  and  roof  of  stars.   galaxies  dancing  in  harmony  and  their  planets  dancing  in  chaos  like  a  butterfly  fighting  in  its  chrysalis ,  ready  to  face  life. 

  crimson  threads  covered  in  purple  sparks ,  pink  orbits  circling  around  silver  dust ,  yellow  stars  trembling  on  dark  blue  plates.   the  cosmos  and  its  speechless  beauty ,  the  cosmos  and  its  horrific  borders.   there ,  he  was  sitting ,  on  a  pedestal  of  nebulae ,  with  dark  matter  hiding  his  face  and  white  orbs  around  his  head.   the  one.   he  saw ,  he  listened ,  he  remembered ,  the  flutes  of  prosperity ,  the  pipes  of  birth.   eru ,  father  of  all ,  holding  the  universe  in  his  arms ,  consisting  both  good  and  evil  in  his  light ,  his  power  endless.

                       𝑚𝑦 𝑤𝑖𝑠ℎ 𝑖𝑠 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑡𝑜 𝑠𝑒𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑚𝑎𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑏𝑢𝑡 ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑚𝑜𝑠𝑡 𝑏𝑒𝑙𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑑 𝑠𝑒𝑟𝑣𝑎𝑛𝑡. 𝑙𝑜𝑜𝑘 & 𝑡𝑒𝑙𝑙, 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑤ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑚𝑎𝑑𝑒, 𝑐𝑎𝑛 𝑖𝑡 𝑏𝑒 ℎ𝑜𝑚𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑎𝑙𝑙, 𝑐𝑎𝑛 𝑖𝑡 𝑏𝑒𝑎𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡, 𝑤ℎ𝑖𝑐ℎ 𝑖𝑠 𝑔𝑜𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡𝑜 𝑐𝑜𝑚𝑒? 

Fear was not something the Valarind felt easily; and why should they? Here in the hills and dales of the Mansions of Aulë delved far beneath their sunny reaches, they had no reason to fear. As the Maia of Aulë, it was alongside his master that their fëa departed their physical forms and became as light, as mythic and had placed within the earth its ores and metals, gemstones and sediments. Silt and clay that would nourish Yavanna’s verdant things varnished atop that, delving valleys and raising mountains before the others imparted their own work. Yet, since the Discord of Morgoth, he feels in him a traitorous thing: envy. At Eru’s presence amid a vault of stars, nebulae swirling at his feet and still so wonderfully imperceptible by all but immortal eyes. Yet Mairon remained in his hröa that was like walking with stones for feet.

How he longed for the jealous remembrance of being vast and endless!

“Thou speak’st of life, doth thou not, m’lord?” Mairon replies cautiously, staving the resentment for cumbersome limbs and molten matter compacted into so small a form. He is contained and it is unbearable. Yet, all the same was the Creator of All before him, and he would not yield. “Thine earth is yet a firmament waiting for life in restless anticipation. The Lady Yavanna hath fill’d its corners with life, as mine master and I hath embedded mineral and stone, delved valleys and raised mountains, all in hope for thy works to come. We believe it prepared, m’lord.” 

Even though life already was! The dwarves forced to sleep might have seen it!

[naragukil]

smaugiiisms‌: 

  SHARP inhale and exhale, chest rise and fall, body  feeling LIMP as he staggers onto his feet–moving side- to-side as he stands, gripping onto the bars that separated Him from Them. Albeit new to the form, he had discovered  few of his abilities SHINING compared to others. He lets a  PAINFUL growl against his throat, slowly leaning against  the bars and chains that kept him in a BARRIER, a large, WICKED grin to come across his features, baring his sharp teeth at the very idea. MEN ARE WEAK. They didn’t know what they had in their dungeons, after all. They were not  AWARE that there were DEMONS shackled and tied up, EASY to release. It makes a long giggle pass his toothy barrier, the very idea of CORRUPTING and DESTROYING. 

❝ They are WEAK, ❞

  The drake hisses out with a lift in his voice towards the end of what he says. SILENCE. OBSERVATION. Slit pupils can be  found flickering and adjusting to the DARKNESS that encumbers them, making out the figure much more clearly. Slowly, his skin grows SCORCHING to the touch, chest and throat turning shades of red and orange, his FIRE burning bright–a CRUEL LIGHT. 

❝ … Plan? ❞

  He asks with interest, keeping himself propped against the bars. How he was ready to learn as necessary of how to behave like THEM, what he was USEFUL for… He was a fast learner and a good achiever, especially if it required someone to get hurt. FIRE and DEATH are part of what he is, his motivations, and now, things that made for a swell ALLIANCE. However, there are a few thoughts in Smaug’s mind that he wishes to announce before all else. 

❝ … They don’t know who I am or why I am still alive. However, I do     have a few ideas of my own to help on this CONQUEST. ❞

There is a present wrath at his fate, at being so flagrantly consigned to that which would simply not last. They think this is darkness when the depths of Utumno and Angband were where it was conceived,  when Sauron saw the Discord of Melko before man even dreamed in the Timeless Halls. This? It is barely twilight for him, and these chains could be melted down with incredulous ease. His Sight can see where they think themselves privately met, behind their seaboard walls mounted high to protect only against the fiercest winds that rankle Westernesse.  Tar-Mairon would yet rise to be their king, beyond the steeples of the  highest palaces that crown the island like jewels. Above all, he knows what his fellow prisoner thinks, can feel his wroth that slithered about the Valarind’s own malace and avarice for corruption. 

“They’re arrogant,” Sauron replied simply, blandly. 

These chains were not Angainor, incapable of truly wresting him of power. It could be, if he wanted, simply melted and  Sauron would walk free among them. Though his face is truly expressionless, Sauron schemes. Ar-Pharazôn is a greedy man, and he knows that the gods have fled Arda.  They exist on a plane of their own making, and Sauron is among the only ones left, as even Melian the Maia and  her Maiarind daughter had fled from the airs of the world.  “The king seeks power. The gods are no more, yet I remain. I am a font of power he would not otherwise possess. With me, he could achieve his lust to reach Valinor’s ivory shores.” It makes Sauron distantly nostalgic, remembering his past in the Mansions of Aule in Valmar on the shining isle. Even the minds of the dreaming cannot reach even Lórien, as Sauron’s own fëa couldn’t reach the gamboling Pastures of Yavanna or Mahal’s  irons beneath the earth, despite how much of him craved to be able to. Those days were no more; Mairon was dead. 

“Tell me yours.”

[naragukil]

gynvaell‌: 

            The  snicker  of  his  men  echoed  through  the  trees ,  the  billowing  of  the  forest  &  wind ,  the  deep  dusk  of  the  light ,  it  gave  the  image  of  Fae  dancing  hidden  in  their  home.  Enchanting ,  but  so  very  deadly.  No  one  made  demands  in  their  abode ,  no  one  dared  threaten  –  they’ll  destroy  the  likes  of  them  as  they  did  everyone  before  this  one’s  army.  They’ll  do  so  with  laughter.  Perched  at  the  highest ,  deepest  point ,  Eldain  merely  observed ,  leaving  his  soldiers  be  as  they  plotted  in  hushed  whispers.  They’ve  dealt  with  so  many ,  countless ,  endless  threats  before.  They  needn’t  his  commands  to  make  quick  work  of  imperious  pricks.

His temper is short, and patience at best is a frayed, burning thing. Without even a trace of mercy does supreme sight beyond mortal comprehension know and perceive where the laughter emanated, and with the cruelty of a god is it punished. Fire blooms in their hearts, but not from passion. The first screaming denotes its place, then another--and half a dozen more, at least. Imperiously and haughtily is his chin raised as the inflicted fall dead, holes wrought in their chest where flesh and bone smoked to ruin. The stench of burning flesh fumigates harshly, smoky grotesqueness that fills the lungs and packs it with morbid pollution. 

“Am I to make a pyre of you all, then?” 

[mayghenan-blog]

An unspeakable exhaustion that sleeping could never quench overcomes him as the Ainu freely embraces Ganondorf from behind, burying his face into his fiery mane.

        It’s late, far too late for him to be awake, but sleep was never something that ever came easily to the king. Often, he spent nights sitting hunched over a heavy book, or scratching down any and all thoughts that crossed his mind on a piece of parchment in candlelight. Maybe it was a way to avoid what he sees when he closes his eyes at night, blood-soaked sands and the flash of swords, spears, daggers. Too many times has he awoken in a cold sweat with sounds of screams ( the screams of his people ) ringing in his ears.

       The bed creaks, sinks beneath his heavy weight as he settles back down on the edge. Ganondorf still isn’t sure if he could sleep now, despite having gone through nearly half of a thick novel in the span of a few hours, despite exhaustion tugging at his eyelids and making his eyes burn. He heaves a sigh, prepared to lie heavily on his side and hope that sleep comes to him, but a familiar presence makes itself known behind him.

       Sauron has been there the whole time, of course, he was well aware of how he had been watching him from the shadows on the other side of the bed. Were it anyone else, Ganondorf would have nearly twisted their arm right from their socket for daring to lay a hand on him. With Sauron, he allows the Ainu to press close to his broad back, wind his arms around his waist and fold his hands in front of his abdomen. He’s warm, he’s always warm, as if a fire burns beneath his skin.

       It reminds him of home.

       The fingers of one large hand brush over one thin wrist, then practically envelope the two hands clasped in front of him. He allows Sauron to sink into his hair, nuzzle into it as if it were some sort of wild pillow. Then he brings a hand to his lips, presses a kiss to his knuckles almost reverently. Such tenderness only allowed for one being.

       “We should rest,” he suggests in a voice so gentle it clashes with his usual rough tone, almost startlingly so. “But I’d need you to move.”

       He shifts then, brings his legs up onto the bed and twists at the waist, an arm winding around Sauron’s smaller frame and managing to pull him into his lap and gather him close to his chest. Ganondorf holds him as if he were something delicate, even though he is anything but. Fingers card through inky hair, and he lies back, eyes focusing on the high ceiling.

       “Sleep continues to evade me,” he states, voice quiet. “Perhaps your presence will make it come easier. Stay with me like this.”

[naragukil]

[whybray]

[mayghenan-blog]

@naragukil, from here.

        ‘Love’ is something that has been foreign to him for a long, long time. When he was younger, many many years ago, he felt it. He felt it so strongly it was almost painful. But years and years have hardened him, made him avoid things such as love and closeness; they were only distractions, nothing more.

        But here, this is different. Sauron is different. They fit together easily, and Ganondorf remembers what it’s like to love and be loved in return. A warm feeling, not so tepid and sticky like he would have thought before. With Sauron, there is a shift in demeanor no one but he is allowed to see. For him, he would be soft; for him, he would kneel. For him, he’d tear the world apart if that’s what Sauron wanted.

                        ( And they’re both more than capable of doing so — it’s a wonder they haven’t tried together. )

        Two powerful beings brought to their knees for one another. He could see himself doing so for no one else.

        He practically hunches over to allow Sauron to reach his face with his lips, breathes in that familiar scent and basks in that familiar warmth. Ganondorf’s arms circle tighter, one hand sliding up to cradle the back of the other’s head as he kisses between his eyes, against his jaw.

        “I do hope you’ll forgive my absence,” he murmurs against his lips.

[naragukil]

“How foolish of you to think my mercy as one so easily given,” Sauron couldn’t help but tease, though there was no malice or intention of following through on whatever nonsensical promise that might turn into being. Though such proximity would’ve been unknown once, with his beloved it was far more easily done. That he’d find less suffocation in such closure and understand it for what it was, a gesture of devotion and affection.

There’s warmth, a summery haze. Maybe less the touches on what could be excused as skin than the sensation that carries with it. A faintly impish smile flits to his features before the Valarind quickly smothers their lips together and then darts away with as much mischief, feigning ignorance. Dare he say he felt happy? That there was enough levity to understand the splendor of sunlight?

Ganondorf’s kingdom spans wide and beautiful, of rolling sands even though it differs so much from this place in Umbar where the sea graces the shore with azure, pale beaches accented from afar by milling palms that sway in these languid breezes. The expanse of Adri Bay yawned openly while the sails of ships rippled from afar. 

“Come. You must be tired from your travels, Ethanu men. And I will not have an honored guest to weather here in the sun.” Even if it could be hardly called harsh. The whitewashed palace that crowned the bay had been loaned to him for this visit, for none cared to dishonor their unifier. 

“I am sure you have many tales you wish to tell.”

[grvntcd-a-deactivated20191208]

What is Decadence? (closed)

[naragukil]

grvntcd‌: 

      RuYi gave the barest tilt of her head as she listened, sensing his faltering at the considerations of life and the existence of the material. Well, now she had a better idea of what he was. Or did she?

Perhaps she could change the subject, and give herself more time to figure him out and allow him to get his bearings. Besides, she’d not yet properly introduced herself. Maybe apologizing and revealing what she represented would help him. In some ways… they were alike.

“We seem to have that in common…” She finally responded, “The ‘ not meant to be contained ’ bit, I mean.” 

After a brief moment’s pause, she continued on, first backing up a step to offer a bow and show her respects to her fellow inhuman. “I apologize for the confusion and impertinence of not introducing myself. My given name is RuYi, though many in the Heavens know me as the personification of Fate, or that eternal cycle of cause and effect that seems to define the goings-on of the universe itself.”

She watched his face for another moment, “I’ve been around in this physical body for quite some time, so I’ve gotten used to life and the material, and I didn’t mean to cause you any confusion. I have spoken on impulse based on my observation. You looked lonely, and I wondered why.”

“RuYi, then. Know me simply as Sauron, or not at all,” he spoke plainly, the sensation of overwhelm subsiding enough that he felt coherence again, doing as he did in the poor task of forgetting he was corporeal, real. That the energies and frequencies of the universe flowed through him actively once more, finding the closest to peace as he’d ever come through it. But at the very least, there was some sense of welcome at her admission of what sort of immortal she was.

Like him, yet not. For this definition of Fate felt as though her dominion was among mortals, for he felt no resonance except a feeling of alienation humans themselves bequeathed. Like looking through a mirror, he supposed. 

For one who spoke well enough, the bridges felt as though they’d burned. As though he were watching them through the charred blaze, numbly and with indifference. Yet, when she offers him a proper greeting does he incline his head in turn, even though he doesn’t care to speak the long procession of titles that came with his indirect rulership of the Five Kingdoms. Mayhap some other time. “Then you must be unique, but I do not believe you govern the fates of Arda. There is a world connected by a thread, through the Narrow Roads, known as Gaia. I sense connection there. But I am honored to be in your presence nonetheless.” 

Rare that his drive to conquer and corrupt is muted here, unmoved by the tropical flora that bobs restively in these courtyards. Palm fronds sway in the sweetest winds, but he feels nothing for it. Only the solid earth at his feet feels grounding. “I was never meant for this life. Even if called old, it is too young. A form as this, a cage, it suits me ill. That you might live in one and thrive could be considered a talent. All it does it drive me ever closer to a precipice I can see myself nearing closer to with every passing eon.”

[lunima]

                  // ☾ BC SUFFERING ⇢ @naragukil

ALL  AND  EVERYTHING  AND  NOTHING;  and  all  and  everything  and  nothing.  it pulses ‘neath her flesh. HOLINESS stinging her veins. it burns her blood, a solar flare scorching it way through the maze of her body with every drawn breath. It paralyzes her, drives her to her knees where she crawls blindly to him. she wears her guise well when she must, but when her reality demands attention it is with the fury of dying stars. How dare she be entombed in such a prison?! SHE who breathed her first breath with the creator. SHE who was older than the suns and the dark. Another ugly throb of rage and pain, one that cracks the marble under her palms. She reaches out until she finds him, fingers knotting themselves in fabric, hoisting herself upright until a moon-white head rests in his lap. Her tears are a furious, luminous thing. They carve bright, burning streams down her agonized face.  ‘ why am i cursed to be this.  ‘  words are bitter, even in silence, sobs muffled as she presses damp cheeks against strong thighs    ‘  i cannot be human, i cannot be other. i can only burn.  ’ 

[naragukil]

At first, he is paralyzed by the weight of her rage, of her grief. It is as they are, that emotions and humanity is crushing for them. He can feel her starry collapse as he remembered countless others through the eons it took to create the universe, and he understands. His fingers flex, remembering that he, too, was caged in a body he yearned to but could never again escape. That he was chained to stones and earth and its molten core when his fëa weighed too heavily, like air and fire at once and cosmic flares that a body couldn’t dream to contain. But as Ezra crawls towards him drenched in starfire and chaotic motes of grief does he silently understand. Carefully does he remove her head enough that he can hunker to the ground and equally embrace her, cradling her within his arms. “Then burn,” he said simply, because he can offer no comfort when his ability to cope is but a lie. Maybe because he wants to feel something of that cosmic fire again, maybe because he thinks it could help her somehow. It is both cherished and absorbed by his primordial darkness, and he is useless. “Burn yourself, the world. Burn mortality away until nothing is left. Do what even I cannot.”

[grvntcd-a-deactivated20191208]

What is Decadence? (closed)

@naragukil / cont’d from here

      RuYi’s expression and eyes remained cool and neutral as she waited for his response, only to internally roll her eyes at the one he gave. Figures that everyone but her interpreted ‘ decadence ’ as material wealth. What was this inclination even about? Decadence meant moral or cultural decline by excessive indulgence in pleasure or luxury. But her idea of luxury was quite different from the typical.

What she deemed luxury was not mountains of gold, silver, and jewels. Or of silks, finery and wine. It was nature itself, and the life that all things gave. Life and the sensations gained from it, be it pleasure or pain. She was the personification of Karma, after all. Her very essence represented cause and effect, action and consequence. What did she care for material wealth? It was of no consequence to a being as ancient and ever-lasting as she. As he said, it would fail and rot before her.

Still, she spoke, her tone cool and inoffensive, “Material wealth is not what I meant, Sir. I apologize if I spoke incorrectly.” She offered a small smile as she continued, “What I meant was the luxury of life itself, surrounding oneself with the very things nature gave, like stone, water, plants, animals, and people. To look around and see and feel the energy, emotion and life that circulated about you. Why not surround yourself in that?”

[naragukil]

What was certain was the other immortal’s words did ring true, it seemed a constant and jarring reminder of how utterly alienated he felt from the rest of his brethren, how the physical only seemed to endlessly confound him. Though what she spoke of was something all Ainu knew of, he couldn’t yet dwell on it. Not properly. Nature held no beauty for him, because All that existed in its own chaos bore no duality, when it was depths of fire and stone that drew him ere the more. But that...thing, luxury? It seemed so intangible a thing. 

“I do not understand the necessity in the physical. Of...things. This existence has been so brief and new that I cannot comprehend it.” Did Eru ever regret what he’d done? The mistake that had been made? Even now, he could barely understand what the present even was when he’d seen time itself borne of two impish dwarves with their months and seasons. “To be here, to be manifest...my mind was not made for it.” He seemed strangely detached, faraway, but more bemused than he began. 

“My kind were never made to be housed, to be contained. They forgot when they were bound to Arda and we finished crafting the universe, but...I never forgot. This life, these things, that one sees as physical and solid I...I only see energy, atoms. Mortals and their emotions do nothing but constrict until it suffocates.” Though it was difficult to tell, the Valarind grew visibly restless trying to comprehend tangibility. As if he might break from the effort of trying. “I don’t... I don’t understand it,” he admitted weakly, an admission he’d kept secret for so long.

[naragukil]

❝ If you’re not surrounded by decadence, my question to you is—why not? ❞

Wealth--it had no meaning to him. Even when he could conceive that which was endless and without measure, older than the ores in the earth, the sun in the sky or the moons in their heavens, it meant nothing to him. To see wealth, it was merely power. Power that his hidden avariciousness so carnivorously craved. A high-walled kingdom with vast holdfasts and a corrupt court were as enticing as their endless coffers of gold and jewels. Yet, when one would see him in some humane shroud, he wore no ornamentation nor riddled himself with finery or gold. Clad in blacks and grays, plain as stone newly gleaned from the earth. It is why the Djinn’s question bodes little in him but indifference, a truest nonchalance. 

“I am older than the core of the earth, the stars in the sky, or the sun and moon in the heavens. Why should I desire that which fails and rots sooner than the blink of an eye? It means nothing to me.” 

[naragukil]

"My body is like a harp and your words and gestures are like fingers running upon the wires."

It had been slow, so very slow. So whittled and unforeseeable that he doubted Ganonorf had noticed at all: the barest streaks of cloudy gray in his locks, the faint loss of luster in the downed lights, the barest of ash in his proud, Gerudo-dark complexion or the barest rheumy opacity within his eyes. Did this other Dark Lord see the long tales of corruption that he’d been inescapably marked with? Sauron did not avail them with some twisted pride, nor with some cold dread, but simply saw them as being no different from erosion nor the way the sea weathered away the shore. Sometimes, he could not tell where obsession began and the truth of their terrible sentiments began; of what was honesty, and what was greed. Perhaps they were never meant to tell the difference betwixt them. 

“And what does the melody sound like?” Sauron asked idly of Ganondorf, holding the king’s proud features between his hands. It is then that he chastely presses a kiss to the Gerudo’s lips, slow and enrapturing.

[solasan]

it will stop your breath, how cruel i can be. but you understand, don’t you? you are clever enough. i am a demanding creature. i am selfish and cruel and extremely unreasonable. but i am your servant. when you starve i will feed you; when you are sick i will tend you. i crawl at your feet; for before your love, your kisses, i am debased. for you alone i will be weak.

[mayghenan-blog]

god just a big shout out to @naragukil for being my longest lasting and most developed ship partner… been here for 4+ years babey… you’ve seen it all… and i love these disgustingly in love evil hubsbands

[naragukil]

❛ Yet your name is like a summons to all my foolish blood. ❜

“Shall we make a monument to your ruin, then?” 

He can’t hate her; he can’t. No more than the tides can, than earth its gravity, or all the celestial bodies their riveting paths through the universe. He sees her, and he wants. There is no human folly furnishing it, for his avarice runs deep in power, for light that radiated from her and want pulled him, and it drowned him. So intoxicating was it that Sauron wanted to simply stand in its orbit, watching her seated languidly to the starlight ever Westernesse, to be aware of the shock and heat as it radiated like fire. A cold observer, a cold star, dangling above the plunge into magma--he saw it. As mortals flung themselves to its depths, swimming in red and blood and its stench like copper, his was igneous as star fire. Incorporeal and ruinous, like a supernovae come to be. 

Sauron hovered near her, over her. Seeing her light humans couldn’t, the way imperceptible lunar flares greeted him in her orbit like a black hole, but repelled and craving all at once. 

His smile, it is a grim and distant thing, seeing the dive, the plunge, more clearly than ever.

“Or should it be to mine?”

[naragukil]

"I remember well your eyes, the touch of your hand and my delirium."

This was the shape of their madness, wasn’t it? Through the run of Ganondorf’s lives, one thing would be abundantly clear: he’d never understand the flesh and blood of a mortal love, of the way it had claws and fangs that sank into anything solid and hoarded itself zealously in the graveyards of the heart. Kept in a box until it rotted and decayed, and longer. That of a god’s was like air, without claustrophobia and the containment within the earth, within blood. What life this was, how long it’d been--neither could say. Even as he was buried in a monument of Ganondorf’s sturdy arms, the sight of his flaring inferno of a mane that grew like vines, this was his box. This was the grave of the Dark Lord in that of one of the few he saw keenly as equal. Madness, it was obvious. How Sauron inspired it, fueled it--created it. Through that gaze of gold he saw lust, want, contentment, and earth. A fire burning within its hearth--was that what he was? 

“Am I your madness, then, Ethanu men?” he asks honestly, without reservation. Cold as steel but harboring an unfathomable passion of his own. One Ganondorf would never understand, but loved all the same. Just as he’d come to love this coffin, this hearth he was buried in. “Or is it something else?” Your fire?