Chapter 45,

Aela broke.

Her sob escaped as a sharp, keening sound—raw, unguarded, the kind of pain that split through the bones. She bent over Elena's chest and clutched her tightly, shaking with the fury of someone losing not just a parent, but an anchor, a home, a whole world. "Please don't go," she whimpered. "I still need you."

A few paces away, Legolas remained still—too still, as if trying to carry his sorrow in silence.

But when he heard Aela cry out, honestly cry, something inside him gave way. His knees hit the ground with a soft thud, and he bowed his head, silver-gold hair falling forward to veil his face. Tears slipped down his cheeks unchecked, his shoulders trembling beneath his leathers. He did not try to speak. There were no words for grief like this.

Thranduil knelt beside them, and for the first time in an age, he looked like a man, not a king.

He looked older, smaller, as if the weight of centuries had caught up with him all at once. His hand, once so steady, so untouchable, shook as he reached out to brush Elena's blood-matted hair from her brow. "I should have come sooner," he whispered, voice like ash. His breath trembled as he leaned down and pressed his forehead to hers, and in that simple gesture, everything shattered.

"I wasn't there when you needed me," he murmured, barely audible. "And I will never forgive myself."

Thranduil lingered.

His forehead rested gently against Elena's, and he didn't breathe momentarily. He stayed there, still and unmoving, as though the sheer force of his presence could call her soul back. As though she might stir beneath his touch, open her eyes, and tease him for the tears she'd never seen fall. But she remained silent, the warmth fading from her skin beneath his hand. The quiet became unbearable.

He drew back, just enough to look at her face again.

There was peace there, somehow—beneath the blood, the pain, and the cold. A shadow of a smile lingered on her lips, the final remnant of the words she'd spoken to them, of the love she had carried even into her last breath. "Le melin," he whispered back, voice cracking. He had never told her often enough. He had thought there would be time.

They would not leave her behind.

When Thranduil finally helped Aela to her feet and cradled his daughter close, he returned to Elena's body and knelt gently. He reached beneath her with trembling hands, and with a grace and strength born not of war but of love, he lifted her into his arms. Her head fell softly against his shoulder, her blood still warm where it had soaked into her armor. Aela clung to his side, one hand resting on her mother's arm, as if letting go would mean losing her again.

Legolas walked a half-step behind them.

He had not spoken since the moment her body went still, not even to his father. His face remained composed, but his eyes were glassy and red-rimmed, his breaths tight and shallow, like he feared they might turn into sobs. He stayed close to Aela, a silent shadow, his bow slung unused across his back. His gloved hand briefly brushed her shoulder once, not to comfort her but to remind her that she was not alone in the silence.

The soldiers, the dwarves, the survivors—all stood in silence as they passed.

None dared speak. Not even Thorin, though his chest rose and fell as if something inside him were cracking further with every step. The weight of his mistakes pressed down like stone, and when Thranduil reached the ruined gate of Erebor, Thorin stepped forward, face pale, eyes hollow. At first, he didn't meet Thranduil's gaze, but his voice carried the weight of truth when he spoke.

"She deserves to lie in the Hall of Kings," Thorin said, quiet and shaken. "No soul-no dwarf, no man, no elf—has ever earned that place more than she. Let it be this if there is one honor I can give her."

Thranduil looked at him for a long time, saying nothing.

He didn't scoff, didn't argue. He saw the truth in Thorin's eyes—the regret, the grief, the understanding that it was too late to undo what had been done. But slowly, gently, he shook his head. "She never wanted gold," he said, voice soft as snow falling on a grave. "She never craved titles or crowns. She asked for peace, earth beneath her feet, and wind in the trees above. She will be buried beneath the tree where we first became one. It was her favorite place in all the world."

Even Thorin bowed his head to that.

"Then let her rest where love still lives," he murmured. "And may her memory outlast the mountain."

A hush followed them as they walked on, leaving the gates of stone and ruin behind. The path they took curved gently down into the woodlands near the foot of the mountain, where snow softened the world, and the trees still stood untouched by war. Thranduil led the way, carrying her as he once had through celebration and ceremony, not with armor but grace. Aela kept her hand on her mother's, and Legolas never once left her side.

A week had passed since the battle, and still the mountain mourned.

Winter's breath lingered over Dale, curling through the ruins and into the woods where a great circle of life had formed around death. The funeral drew many more than Thranduil had expected. Dwarves stood beside men, elves beside warriors of Lake-town, and none questioned the presence of the other. Grudges had been quieted, if only for this day, for her.

Elena had united them in death as she had in life.

She lay beneath the boughs of the great tree she had once called her favorite, where she and Thranduil first spoke vows not beneath a crown, but beneath the stars. A wooden bed had been crafted—simple, beautiful, carved with quiet reverence. Upon it, she rested as though she were only sleeping. Her pale pants and high boots were clean and mended, her white tunic loose and laced at the throat. She looked peaceful. Strong.

Thranduil had refused the suggestion of a dress.

He had laughed once—quietly, bitterly—when the idea was mentioned, the sound more breath than joy. "If I put her in a gown," he said to Legolas, "she'd find a way to claw out of the earth and strangle me with its hem." And so, she was dressed as she had lived, ready for battle and freedom. Her swords rested at either side, hilts nestled against her hips. Her hands were folded over her chest, one thumb resting beneath the pendant she always wore.

Aela stood near the head of the wooden bier, her face pale but her eyes fierce, red-rimmed from sleepless nights.

She hadn't cried today. She had promised herself she wouldn't. Elena had never liked weeping when it did no good, and Aela wanted to honor that, to be steel and flame and everything her mother had raised her to be. But her hands trembled slightly as she adjusted one of the sword hilts, just a fraction, just enough to ensure it looked right. Her brother stood beside her, older in the face than he had been a week ago, one hand resting on her shoulder—quiet support, nothing more.

Thranduil stood at the foot of the bier, his eyes never leaving his wife's face.

The wind tugged at his cloak, and snow kissed the leaves above them, but he did not move. He had dressed not in finery but in a simple dark robe, unadorned, save for the silver circlet he wore only when mourning. He had not spoken since that morning, not to his son, his people, or even Aela. His silence was not cold. It was grief shaped like stone.

Around them, the mourners formed a wide ring.

Aela stepped forward first, the wind catching strands of her dark hair as she stood before the bier. She stared down at her mother, and for a long time, she said nothing. Her throat worked around the words, but they didn't initially come. Elena had always been her guide, her firelight in the dark, her unshakable strength. Now that the fire had gone out, Aela felt lost in a colder world.

"I don't know how to be without you," she said, trembling like the frost-touched leaves above them. "You were everything—my shield, compass, fiercest critic, and defender. You believed in me before I ever knew how to believe in myself. Even when I failed you, you stood behind me."

Her hand reached out, fingers brushing against the cloth folded over her mother's chest. "I'm so sorry I couldn't stop this. I wasn't fast enough. I will carry that always." She drew a shuddering breath, eyes filling but refusing to fall. "But I swear, I will make you proud. I will walk your path and keep your fire burning in this world, no matter how dark it becomes."

When Aela stepped back, Legolas moved forward in her place, quiet and composed, but with a sadness in his eyes that no mask could hide. He looked down at Elena's still form and closed his eyes for a heartbeat. His voice, when it came, was soft and reverent. "You came into our lives like a storm—wild, untamed, impossible to ignore."

"You made my father smile again," he continued, eyes fixed on her face. "You challenged the world with every breath you took and made us all rise to meet your standard. You made us kinder. Stronger. More whole." He reached down and rested his hand gently atop hers. "You were never just kin by marriage. You were my sister, my queen, my comrade in arms. And I will guard them-your children, your memory—as fiercely as you guarded us."

He stepped back with a slow nod, and Thorin came next.

The dwarf king looked as though years had passed in days. His steps were heavy, his expression carved from guilt. He stood in front of the bier, silent for a long while, his hands clenched into fists at his sides. "You followed me into fire," he said at last, his voice rough. "When you should have turned away."

"I offered you a throne of greed, and you returned with a shield of sacrifice," he went on, each word carrying the weight of the mountain behind him. "You stood between us and death, not for power, not for gold, but because your heart would not let you do otherwise. I led you to ruin, and you never let me feel alone once." His voice cracked, and he dropped to one knee, bowing his head. "I failed you, Elena. But I will never forget you. And if the halls of my ancestors have room for memory, they will echo with your name."

Next came Gandalf, his staff clicking gently against the stone as he approached. The wizard stood over her with quiet reverence, the sorrow in his eyes far older than the lines on his face. "There are few who come into this world and change it," he said, voice deep and rich, yet carrying something soft beneath the weight. "And fewer still who do so with such stubborn joy."

"Elena was light and steel wrapped in flesh," he continued. "She bore burdens not meant for one soul, and she bore them willingly. She healed those who hated her, defended those who doubted her, and gave even when she had nothing left." He touched her brow, fingers gentle as snow. "She is not gone. She has become part of this world now. Part of its stone, its wind, its fire. And so long as we speak her name, she lives."

He stepped aside, and Galadriel approached like moonlight, every motion flowing gracefully. Her eyes shimmered with unshed tears, but her voice was steady, the tone of one who sees beyond the veil. "I did not walk the years with you," she said. "But I felt your presence ripple across the tapestry of the world."

"You were flame and frost and thunder, and yet you left in your wake nothing but life." She bent slowly and placed a white blossom on Elena's chest. "You were not bound to fate. You bent it. Shaped it. You reminded us that divinity lies not in lineage, but in love freely given. May the stars remember you. May the wind whisper your name long after ours have faded."

And finally, Thranduil.

He came forward like a man carved from sorrow, his shoulders square despite the weight dragging him low. He did not speak at first. He knelt beside her and took her hand. And then, he broke.

"You promised me forever," he whispered, the words falling like snow, soft and cold. "And I would have held you to it for all eternity." His voice cracked, and for once, he didn't hide it. "You were the voice in my silence. The fire in my winter. The one who looked at the king still saw the man beneath."

He leaned forward and kissed her brow, lingering there, like he could warm her back into waking. "I will find you again, meleth nîn. In the wind, the stars, and every tree you once touched. I will find you—and I will never stop carrying you."

When he stood, his hand never left hers.

The silence that followed Thranduil's farewell was devastating in its stillness.

Not even the breeze dared interrupt. All who had come to say goodbye stood motionless, a great circle of hearts bound in mourning. Eyes blurred with tears. Shoulders trembled, but no sobs rose—only the quiet ache of souls cracking apart as the reality of her death settled like frost over the living. Elena, who had once been the flame at the center of so many lives, now lay beneath the roots of an ancient tree, the breath of her memory caught in the hush of winter air.

Aela pressed a hand to her chest, her breaths sharp and shallow.

She didn't try to hold back the tears anymore. Her fingers, still stained with dried blood from that final day, curled into her tunic like she could anchor herself to something—anything—but the world felt like it was spinning away from her. Her legs nearly gave out as the ropes began to move, as the wooden bier carrying her mother's body lifted from its resting frame. Thranduil caught her when she faltered, wrapping an arm around her shoulders, and for once, the strength in his limbs was not for battle, but for his daughter.

Together, they watched the bier lower into the grave.

The creak of rope and the soft groan of wood were the only sounds. The sunlight, filtered through bare branches, spilled in fractured gold, catching on the silver runes carved into the bed. It kissed Elena's brow, her folded hands, her blade hilts. She looked asleep, tired, but peaceful. But there was no rising breath. No flutter of lashes. Just stillness, cradled in wood, encircled by roots that would now take her and keep her forever.

The ropes slackened.

The bier rested against the earth, a bed now turned to tomb. Aela stepped forward, her lips trembling, and placed her mother's pendant, once worn beneath armor and tunic, against the folds of her sash. "You never took it off," she whispered, voice cracking. "So now you won't have to." She pressed her fingers over it one final time, then drew them away like she was tearing off a piece of herself.

Legolas dropped a braid of evergreen and starflower, picked from the grove Elena used to walk through with Aela when the world felt too heavy.

Gandalf placed a smooth white stone etched with an ancient rune for guidance—his way of marking her journey to the next world. Galadriel knelt and whispered words in the old tongue, her tears silent but glistening. Even the dwarves approached, one by one, laying small tokens—a gemstone, a bead of braided gold, a piece of iron once forged in Dale. Thorin's offering came last: his ring of kingship, pressed gently beside her swords. He said nothing aloud. But the way his hand lingered, trembling, said everything.

And then, Thranduil stepped forward alone.

He knelt, not as a king, but as a man—one undone, one hollowed out. His hand moved gently over her cheek, brushing a loose strand of hair from her face. "I cannot bear this," he whispered, barely audible. "But I will." He kissed her brow, long and slow, and lingered there, like part of him might stay with her if he held on just a moment longer.

But the time came.

The ropes were pulled back. The grave began to close—handfuls of soil poured with reverence—no shovels were used—just palms, silence, and the shared understanding that this moment was not meant to be rushed. The last thing to fall was a cover of soft moss and pine needles, laid down by Aela with tears tracking fresh paths down her cheeks.

When it was done, and the grave lay sealed beneath the roots, Thranduil stepped forward again.

He reached into the folds of his cloak and drew out a small, carved stone. Upon it was a sigil—a tree, a dragon, and a crown woven into one. He placed it atop the moss, fingers brushing the edge, and whispered in Elvish, "Le hannon, meleth nîn. Namárië." His voice broke on the final word.

Thank you, my love. Farewell.

And the wind finally rose, weaving through the leaves above them, gentle, warm, as if the forest was weeping.

The stars began burning through the clouds when Thranduil returned to her.

He had slipped away from the remnants of the gathering without a word, his long cloak trailing behind him like a shadow. The path to the tree was one he had walked countless times in life, but never like this—never with each step weighted like stone, never with the cold reaching so deeply beneath his skin. The lantern in his hand cast only the gentlest light, enough to see her resting place beneath the roots, now blanketed in pine needles, snow, and offerings of love.

He did not speak at first. He stood in silence, gazing down at the small carved stone that marked her grave.

The sigil he had etched into it—the tree, the dragon, the crown—had taken hours to carve. He had done it himself, with shaking hands and no magic, refusing help, because some things were meant to be done in pain. Now he knelt, the snow soaking through his knees, and pressed his hand to the earth.

"You should be beside me still," he whispered, voice hoarse from silence. "You were supposed to grow old with me beneath this tree." He swallowed hard, jaw tightening. "You were supposed to scold me when I was too proud, tease me when I refused to eat, and laugh when I forgot how to. You were not meant for the grave."

He bowed his head.

"I will find you again," he said softly. "Across stars. Across time. I will find you, even if it takes the death of everything else to do so."

He remained there long into the night, long after the lantern flickered out, his breath misting in the cold, keeping silent vigil over the woman who had taught him how to live—and left before she could teach him how to go on without her.

The moon was bright and full, casting its silver glow like a gentle hand over the clearing. Aela moved through the trees with slow, reverent steps, each footfall nearly soundless despite the brittle frost beneath her bare feet. Her cloak was wrapped tight around her, but she welcomed the cold—it felt honest, felt like something her mother might have embraced. The night was quiet, sacred, as though the stars had dimmed their song out of respect for the woman who now slept beneath the ancient tree's roots.

She reached the grave without hesitation.

The earth was undisturbed now, soft and moss-covered, offerings still resting where they had been placed a week before. A white flower remained near the center, half-frozen but still beautiful, like a stubborn piece of memory refusing to die. Aela knelt and ran her fingers through the pine needles, finding the carved stone her father had set, her hand resting against it as though it could somehow pulse with her mother's heartbeat.

"I miss you," she whispered, the words catching in her throat. "I miss your voice, your laugh, your lectures about tightening my guard and cleaning my boots. I miss how you said my name when I was about to do something reckless." Her lips trembled. "And I miss how you always forgave me when I did it anyway."

She bowed her head, tears slipping freely now.

"I'm scared, Mama," she whispered. "Not just because you're gone, but because you were always the strong one. You were our fire; I don't know if I'm enough to carry it now. But I'm going to try. I swear I'm going to try."

A shift in the forest breeze made her pause. A branch overhead swayed.

And then there was a footstep behind her.

She didn't need to turn to know who it was. The silence's weight and the movement's careful grace were familiar. Legolas initially stepped into the moonlight, his expression unreadable, though the grief in his eyes was unmistakable. He knelt beside her without a word, his hand resting on the opposite side of the grave, mirroring her.

"I thought I would find you here," he said softly. "I have not been able to sleep."

Aela nodded, swallowing down another wave of tears. "She wouldn't want us to fall apart," she murmured.

"No," Legolas agreed. "But she would have understood if we did."

His voice was quiet, stripped of its usual steadiness, and when he looked at Elena's resting place, something broke in his face. "She was my mother, in every way that mattered," he said, and his voice wavered. "She taught me how to fight, yes. But she also taught me how to forgive. How to see the strength in gentleness. She gave me more than I ever knew I needed."

His shoulders trembled once, barely.

"I never told her how much that meant to me. I always thought I'd have more time." He bowed his head then, brushing his hand across the moss. "She gave her life for people she didn't owe anything to. And we will never stop owing her for that."

Aela leaned against him, her shoulder pressing into his, and for a long moment, they stayed like that—brother and sister in grief, children of fire and shadow, holding to the last warmth they shared.

"Do you think she's still watching us?" Aela asked, her voice a broken whisper. All her brother could do was look at the stars, praying their mother was happy and truly at peace.

Time flowed differently after Elena's death.

The world did not forget her—not in the halls of Erebor, the forests of the Woodland Realm, or the hearts of those who had once fought beside her. The seasons shifted with their quiet rhythms: blossoms in spring, golden leaves in autumn, and snow that drifted like falling ash in winter. And through every turn of the year, the great tree that stood guard over her grave stretched skyward. Its bark darkened with age, its roots deepened, but its presence—like hers—never faded.

Every year, on the day she had fallen, the clearing filled with silence and memory.

In the first spring, Bilbo came. He was thinner and quieter, with laughter that came less easily, though his eyes still gleamed with mischief. He brought a small wooden carving, a likeness of Elena he had whittled himself, wrapped in cloth and oil to protect it from the damp. "You saved me from so many things," he whispered as he placed it by the stone. "Dragons. Dwarves. Myself." He sat with her until the fireflies blinked through the trees, his pipe smoke curling upward like prayers.

The second year, Thorin arrived.

No crown on his head. No guards at his back. Only Balin and two quiet ponies. Thorin carried no weapons, only a single mountain lily and a scroll he didn't read aloud. He knelt by her grave for nearly an hour in silence, then laid his hand upon the stone. "You were the heart I never earned," he whispered hoarsely. "And the soul I never thanked enough." Balin wept beside him, clutching a polished stone that had once been part of Elena's forge.

In the third year, Kíli and Tauriel came together.

She held a child in her arms—a boy swaddled in green and gold. They called him Elandor, a name forged from fire and light, a name to echo the woman who had saved them both. "You would have scared him senseless and spoiled him rotten," Tauriel said, smiling through tears. "You would've been his fiercest teacher." Kíli placed the child's tiny hand on the stone. "He will know your name before any other. He will grow up hearing your stories, and one day… he will visit this place himself."

Beorn visited when the wildflowers bloomed.

He came in bear form sometimes, silent and broad and watchful. Other times, he brought offerings—honeycomb, roots carved into animals, and once a fox cub he'd found orphaned. He always sat for hours, muttering to himself and her grave. "You were a force," he would say. "And I miss that fire."

Gandalf came often, too often for some to track.

He never stayed long, always too restless. But each time he visited, he brought something new: a flower from a distant land, a poem from an old tongue, a joke she would have groaned at. "You wouldn't believe how troublesome your daughter is," he'd chuckle. "Which means you'd be terribly proud." He never said goodbye when he left. Only pressed his hand to the stone and murmured, "Still watching, aren't you?"

Galadriel never returned.

But once, many years after the mourning had passed into memory, Elrond came.

He came in silence and left behind a crystal shard from the mirror pool at Lórien, placing it just above the carved sigil. "For the one who burned brighter than most," he said softly. "Your light endures." Then he turned, and like a wisp of dawn fog, he vanished into the trees, never to return. And though time passed, and the world moved on, the tree stood unchanging.

Aela returned often, as did her brother and Thranduil, when no one watched. They came not just to grieve but to remember—to remind themselves of the woman who had changed their world with the strength of her heart and the weight of her love.

And beneath the roots of the great tree, Elena still slept.

I think," Legolas replied, glancing up at the stars, "she never stopped."

The path was soft beneath their boots, softened by years of quiet pilgrimage. Morning light filtered through the spring canopy, dappling the earth in shifting hues of gold and green. The tree branches above whispered softly, as though recognizing their approach, not with rustling leaves, but with memory. More than any other in the world, this place knew their grief. It had borne witness to every word unspoken and every toast raised to the wind.

Thranduil strolled, cradling the bottle in one hand with care that had nothing to do with its worth. The glass caught the sun like a jewel, the deep amber liquid within glowing faintly in the light. "She used to complain that it was far too sweet," he said after a while, his voice quieter than it usually was in the forest. "Claimed it tasted like berries mashed by a child's hand."

Gandalf smiled at the memory, his staff thudding rhythmically against the ground. "And then she'd finish the bottle herself, smirking at us like we were the ones being dramatic," he added. "I don't think I've ever known anyone who could win an argument while laughing at you the entire time."

"She had a talent for contradiction," Thranduil agreed, the corner of his mouth twitching with something not quite joy. "I don't think she ever truly liked this wine. But it reminded her of something. Of warmth. Of simpler things."

Their feet found the final bend in the path, the air turning cooler as they drew nearer to the clearing. The tree stood just beyond the rise, its thick roots spread like arms across the earth, moss-covered and ancient. They had made this walk every year—never rushed, never late, always with the same wine, always with silence waiting beneath the boughs.

Thranduil took a breath, ready to speak again—perhaps to say what they would toast to this time—but his words never came.

His body stopped mid-step, freezing so suddenly that Gandalf nearly walked past him. The Elvenking's eyes locked forward, his face pale and rigid, and the bottle slipped from his fingers without warning. It fell without grace, the wine still gleaming in the light until it struck stone and shattered. The glass broke with a sharp, crystalline crack, and the sweet fruit wine splashed across the earth like spilled blood.

Neither of them moved.

The forest held its breath.

And Thranduil did not take another step.

The world had gone still again, but not with reverence.

This was the stillness of the aftermath of something sacred torn apart and left to rot in silence. Thranduil stood at the edge of the clearing like a man who had wandered into a nightmare wearing a memory, the image of that tree as it once was—full of shade and peace—burning away behind his eyes. He took one trembling step forward, then another, until the full extent of the destruction unfurled before him like an open wound.

Where the great tree had once stood sentinel over his wife's grave, there was now only a charred ruin.

The trunk had split, blackened to the core, like fire had crawled through its heart. Ash smothered the ground, clinging to the remnants of moss and scorched offerings. The grave itself had been torn open—its careful layering of stone and earth clawed apart, the sacred shape of it unrecognizable now, as though some vicious hand had reached into the soil to rip something precious free.

He didn't even look down. His breath hitched, and then he was moving—faster than Gandalf could call out to him—falling to his knees beside the broken earth. He didn't hesitate. He plunged his hands into the soil, tearing through it like a man drowning, mud caking under his nails as he dug and dug, desperate for the touch of cloth, bone, or steel—anything that might have remained.

There was nothing.

His hands struck only cold rock and splinters of root. No sword. No braid. No pendant. Not even a shard of the wooden bier she had been laid upon.

"No," he whispered. "No, no, no—please."

His voice broke on the last word. He kept digging, as if he could bury the truth deep enough. But when he finally froze, shoulders shaking, he looked down into the hollow and saw nothing but shadow staring back. The grave was empty. Elena was gone.

Behind him, Gandalf stood very still.

He had gone to one knee near the edge of the ruin, lifting a broken axe blade scorched at the edge. The markings were unmistakable—orc-forged, cruel, recent. Fresh blood darkened one corner. All around them, tools lay scattered—hooks, chisels, chains—not just the instruments of war, but instruments of desecration.

"This wasn't looting," Gandalf murmured, his voice low with dawning dread. "It was deliberate. They came here for her."

Thranduil turned toward him, his face white with ash and fury.

"Why?" he choked out, his voice rising. "Why would they take her? What could they possibly want with her bones?" His eyes were wild, too bright, too empty. "She gave them nothing but fire and death—why come back for her now?"

Gandalf didn't answer right away.

Because deep in his chest, a thought had taken root—dark and heavy and growing fast.

And the wind that stirred through the ruined clearing was colder than it had any right to be.

Gandalf stood still as stone, the faint wind catching the hem of his cloak as he stared at the wreckage before them. The clearing that had once been a sanctuary now looked more like a scorched, defiled, and empty battlefield. The scent of burnt earth lingered in the air like something unfinished. His hand gripped his staff tightly, knuckles white around the wood, but no spell could fix this. No wisdom that could make sense of it.

Thranduil remained kneeling in the torn earth, his hands buried in the dirt as though he might uncover some remnant of her. Something—a strand of hair, a forgotten pin, the curve of a blade hilt—anything to anchor him to the truth that she had once been here. But there was nothing. The grave was hollow. The bed they had laid her in was gone, as though it had never existed.

He was trembling, but his voice was low, almost too soft to hear.

"Why?" he whispered again, broken and hollow. "Why take her?"

Gandalf's eyes moved slowly over the grave, the scattered tools, the blackened tree that once watched over them all. He had seen many dark things in his long life. But this-this was not war. This was not random cruelty. This was something older, something patient. Something that had waited eighty years not to destroy, but to take.

The wizard finally shook his head, the lines in his face deepening, sorrow sharpening his features. He turned his gaze toward Thranduil, toward the man who had lost his wife twice now—once to death, and now to something far worse.

"I do not know," he said, and his voice cracked on the edges, weathered by time and failure. "I do not know why this has happened."

Silence fell again, heavy and absolute.

There were no birds, no breeze, just the broken branches, the ash-soaked ground, and the hollow ache in both their chests that refused to ease. Thranduil bowed his head over the empty grave, fingers curling into fists as if he might pull the truth from the soil.

And far above, the clouds shifted like a warning.

The world did not mourn with them.

It simply waited.