Mist did not lift.
It thickened.
What had once been a veil became a chamber, vast and without walls, its silence pressed into shape by unseen hands. Breath carried weight there. Thought echoed. Even memory felt watched.
They stood together once more.
Gandalf, staff grounded as if it anchored him to himself.Galadriel, luminous yet strained, her light drawn inward.Elrond, composed only by habit, his heart already racing ahead of his reason.Saruman, pale and distant, his gaze measuring instead of mourning.Bilbo, small and trembling, clutching courage like a borrowed coat.
They had not come by choice.
They had been called.
A presence unfolded before them, soft as dawn and heavy as grief.
Galadriel gasped.
Before her stood a woman she had not touched in centuries.
"Celebrían…"
The name left her lips as breath leaves a dying flame—fragile, disbelieving, reverent.
Celebrían stood whole.
Not as memory.Not as echo.But as herself.
Her eyes were clear. Her hair fell like moonlit water over her shoulders. Her hands trembled when Galadriel reached for her, as though neither quite believed touch would endure.
They embraced.
No words were spoken.
Galadriel pressed her face into her daughter's hair, fingers digging in as if afraid the dream might tear her away again. Celebrían clung back with equal desperation, sobs silent but uncontained, her grief spilling through centuries all at once.
Elrond watched.
For a moment, the world narrowed to that single sight.
Then his knees gave way.
He crossed the space between them not as a lord, not as a herald of ancient lines, but as a husband broken by absence. When Celebrían turned and saw him, something shattered quietly between them.
"Elrond…"
He took her into his arms, trembling.
"I thought I had lost you forever."
"So did I," she whispered.
They stood together, bound again by touch and pain and love unhealed.
Even Saruman looked away.
Only then did the light around them shift.
Two figures emerged from the mist, not stepping forward but revealing themselves, as if the dream had finally acknowledged their weight.
Varda stood first—starlight woven into form, terrible and gentle in equal measure. Her presence bent the silence, made it holy and unbearable all at once.
Beside her stood Yavanna, crowned in living green, her sorrow blooming like winter flowers in her gaze.
The air changed.
Not colder.
More absolute.
Gandalf bowed at once, staff lowered, head inclined.
"My Ladies."
The others followed, even Saruman, though his bow was measured rather than humble.
Celebrían looked between them, confusion and awe mingling.
"The Valar…" Elrond breathed.
Varda regarded them all, her eyes lingering on Celebrían last.
"You have been summoned into a place not shaped by Arda," she said."Nor governed by its music."
Yavanna's voice followed, softer, burdened.
"A wound has opened between worlds. And through it… a life cries out."
Galadriel felt the Golden Seed pulse in her chest, though it was not with her.
"Her," Galadriel whispered.
Varda inclined her head.
"Yes. Tiriana."
The name struck the dream like a bell.
Gandalf stiffened. Bilbo swallowed. Elrond's grip on Celebrían tightened.
Varda lifted her hand.
"Show us what you have seen."
The dream shifted—not violently, but with the inevitability of fate being unfolded.
They stood above Sellia.
Not yet broken.
Not yet burning.
Banners fluttered from crystal towers. Sorcerers walked the streets with measured purpose. Children laughed in courtyards washed in violet light. Magic hummed—not as threat, but as labor, as life.
At the heart of it stood Tiriana.
She moved through the city not as a tyrant, but as a guardian. Soldiers bowed not from fear, but from trust. Mages straightened at her passing, steadied by her presence.
She listened.
She remembered names.
She paused to rest a hand upon a wounded knight's shoulder, murmuring words that closed flesh and calmed pain.
Galadriel felt it then.
The weight.
"She carries them all," Galadriel whispered. "Every soul."
Yavanna nodded, grief deepening her features.
"And war has already begun to answer her kindness."
The sky darkened.
Far beyond the city walls, the land trembled.
Armies moved.
Scarlet banners unfurled like open wounds upon the horizon.
The soldiers of Sellia gathered.
Some were veterans. Some were young. Many wore the sigils of Radahn alongside Tiriana's own—alliances forged in shared blood and shared battles.
Tiriana stood before them.
She did not shout.
She did not rage.
She spoke plainly.
"We hold," she said."We protect what breathes.""No glory. No pursuit. No mercy wasted on pride."
Her gaze moved across familiar faces.
"Return alive."
A murmur spread—not of fear, but resolve.
The dreamers felt it.
Hope.
Thin. Defiant. Real.
Then—
A presence stirred beside them.
Varda's eyes narrowed.
"Someone else walks this dream."
Fire bloomed.
Not flame of ruin, but of being—shapeless, restrained, ancient.
A pillar of living fire stood among them.
Galadriel recoiled a step.
"Mairon…"
The fire did not answer at once.
When it did, the voice was low, controlled.
"I did not summon myself here."
Saruman's eyes gleamed.
"Sauron."
Varda raised her hand.
"Why do you still exist here?"
The fire wavered—not in fear, but in acknowledgment.
"This place binds us equally," he said."No power. No dominion. Only witness."
Silence followed.
Below them, the first clash echoed.
Steel met spell.
Blood touched earth.
Tiriana's sword sang—not with hunger, but with purpose.
She fought at the city's edge, holding lines together with sheer will, rallying soldiers, dragging the wounded back from collapse.
Each death struck her.
Not as number.
As name.
As memory.
Galadriel pressed a hand to her chest, breath tight.
"She feels them," she said. "Every one."
Sauron's fire dimmed.
"Yes."
The dream did not end.
It deepened.
And Sellia stood—for now.