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Gandalf soon found that carrying the ring was not at all what he had expected. He had expected it to glow almost constantly, as Cirdan had said it would; however, it seemed to shimmer with a cold, faint gleam that seemed slightly too bright for a reflection of the late afternoon Sun, but too dim for a light of its own. He dithered about what to do with the ring; to wear it on his callused, pale finger seemed dangerous nearly to the point of peril. However, the prospect of tucking it into a pocket of his robe to hide it from prying eyes felt as if he were denying the importance of the great charge Cirdan had laid upon him. He settled both gualms by turning the ring so that the bright ruby rested above the palm of his hand rather than the back. Laying his hand flat on his white-robed knee, he noted with some satisfaction that the band of the ring looked entirely ordinary and completely unassuming against the back of his fourth finger.

"The riddle grows ever thicker," he muttered, as he noticed the light of Narya's ruby vanish entirely. "Something is to come of this, though I cannot fathom what."

He was not exactly sure where to go; he had accompanied Cirdan for the last several years, and as far as he knew, there was not much he could do. He wondered where his path should take him. He had always been welcome in Imladris, the Heart of the Elves nestled in the valley of Rivendell, guarded and cleansed by the River Bruinen. He could also let his steps direct him toward Caras Galadhon, the pride of Lothlorien, and home to Galadriel, the Lady of Light.

There was nothing pressing his mind, and the prospect of an unharried visit to either Imladris or to the Valley of Singing Gold seemed a gift denied him too often in the past. As he set up his bedroll under an elm tree which provided both shelter and some relief from the scorching nights of late summer, he smiled at the thought that there was nothing-no plight, no sudden calamity, no prospect of terror-that would hurry his choice.

He would decide in the morning, after a good night's sleep. He tied his horse to an alder tree right beside his elm and chuckled as the white mare whickered into the top of his hood. She had been a gift from Cirdan; a strong Elvish pony with a coat of gleaming white which almost resembled spun moonlight under the cover of darkness. Great black liquid eyes shone intelligently out of a face which Gandalf knew was noble, as far as horses went; and she had a mane and tail of a dirty shade of grey, rather similar to the color of Gandalf's own robes. The strong little mare was named Faelwen, the bringer of justice; Gandalf had thought it appropriate.

He lay down on the bedroll and stared up at the interlacing branches stretching up above him, which seemed to leave tiny spaces almost intentionally, through which the stars could twinkle. Gandalf looked up at the deep blue sky for a few moments and then fell into a sound and sudden sleep. As he slipped into slumber, he heard Faelwen whinnying in an almost confused manner...

His dreams were strange that night. Gandalf was clearly aware of the fact that he was dreaming, but to his astonishment, he could make neither head nor tail of his visions. He knew that he was sleeping in his own strangely elven way; with his eyes fixed wide open and his body as rigid as a plank.

The first to cross his line of sight had been a strange vessel, a pitcher of gleaming mithril with two white gems set into the curve of the handle. A fair white hand had filled the pitcher at a rocky spring, and had then poured it into a wide, shallow stone bowl. As the clear, sparkling water fell toward the cool darkness of the bottom of the bowl, it seemed to lose substance, and become nothing more than a pool of shifting shadow in the basin. Rooted as he was to the ground, Gandalf could not move; all he could do was blink over and over again until the image of the body attached to the hand that held the basin came into focus.

He saw rippling golden hair captured beneath a net embellished with seed-pearls, as well as a tall, slender, and strangely familiar figure. The face was slightly turned, so that he could see the profile; he could distinguish nothing but for a long, sharp nose and a complexion which seemed to be lit from within, but veiled in shadow at the same time. A single pale, pointed ear unveiled the fact that the woman was an elleth The mouth was turned down in worry, and he could faintly make out the figure of someone else, an ellon, similar in stance and bearing to the woman standing with her back toward Gandalf.

"Man cerig, hiril vuin?" came the voice of the ellon. As he drew forward, his features were thrown into sharp relief. One side of his face was entirely veiled in shadow, and the side which was turned toward Gandalf was illuminated so brightly that he could see nothing but the shape of the brow and the bridge of his nose.

To Gandalf's astonishment, the elleth responded in the common tongue.

"A strange shadow hangs over Dol Guldur," she said. Her brow was furrowed, and she leaned closer to the basin. "Can you see anything?"

The ellon drew nearer to the standing basin and bent over it, his silvery eyes searching the murky depths of the bowl. As he leaned closer to the surface of what appeared to be dark water within, a lock of hair very like the elleth's slipped over his shoulder and into the basin. The elf gasped as a sudden caustic smell wafted its way about the gleaming room, and he drew back sharply. Three pairs of eyes-the elleth's, the elf's, and Gandalf's own-widened simultaneously as the elf picked up the strands of golden hair that had fallen into the ornately carved vessel.

They had been burned and shriveled into frail threads of coal black, and promptly crumbled into a fine, dark powder in the ellon's hand.

"What is this, Alatariel?" said the ellon, whose voice was filled with a nameless fear. "Your visions have never taken physical form. What has happened?"

The elleth shook her head in a clear gesture of bewilderment. She too leaned in closer over the basin, and her visage suddenly blazed with a fierce orange and red light which flooded from its base. She let out a cry of pain, as if she had been burned, and cast an arm draped with a fine silken sleeve over her face. To Gandalf's horror, she appeared to be rooted to the ground, unable to turn her back and flee. Her companion ran forward, wrapped an arm about her waist, and pulled her away.

"We must send out the Guard immediately," whispered the elleth, her face suddenly haggard. "My heart tells me he has returned."

Gandalf awoke with a jolt. Leaping up from the ground, he crumpled his bedroll into an unruly heap, stuffed a bit of lembas bread into his mouth, and untied Faelwen from the tree he had secured her to.

"Where to, my friend?" he asked, in response to the mare's questioning eyes. "To Lorien."

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