Armenelos the golden? Nay! By My hand, armenelos the blackened!
I bade them burn the white tree. Reluctantly, they obeyed.
The acrid smoke shrouds the nimbus-wracked sky, split asunder by lightning.
I bade them betray their kindred, despoil, violate, sacrifice; willingly, they complied.
The foolish faithful shriek and wail... the charred charnel-stench arouses My passion.
I bade them breach the ban of the valar and, pridefully, their king voyaged westward.
The menacing wavecrest looms. My goal's at hand: to exterminate these paltry vermin who sought to subjugate Me!
Satisfied, I mount the ebon throne in My impenetrable Temple.
And laugh.
***
"And Sauron, sitting in his black seat in the midst of the Temple, had laughed when he heard the trumpets of Ar-Pharazôn sounding for battle; and again he had laughed when he heard the thunder of the storm; and a third time, even as he laughed at his own thought, thinking what he would do now in the world, being rid of the Edain for ever, he was taken in the midst of his mirth, and his seat and his temple fell into the abyss. But Sauron was not of mortal flesh, and though he was robbed now of that shape in which he had wrought so great an evil ... yet his spirit arose out of the deep ... and came back to Middle-earth...."
The Silmarillion, Akallabêth