I have stood in halls after battle where the air still smelled of iron and grief, and even those places felt kinder than this tavern.

Laketown’s alehouse is loud when I arrive—voices stacked atop one another, boots thudding against wet planks, the smell of smoke and river-water clinging to everything. Thorin sits at the long table with the Company, tankard in hand, a dwarrowdam pressed close at his side. She laughs easily, too easily, her fingers resting where they shouldn’t.

I look away.

Balin catches my eye and says nothing. He doesn’t need to. He knows what I know.

Gandalf told us only that he wished to introduce a powerful ally—one who now commands a realm, an army, and resources that could change the course of our road. Nothing more. No warning. No preparation.

The door opens.

And the room breaks.

Not loudly. Not with chaos. With silence.

She stands just inside the threshold, tall enough that the low beams seem to bow away from her. Moonsilk silver drapes her like water, moss-green leaves embroidered across the bodice catching lantern-light. Her white hair falls loose down her back, unbound, unhidden. The living birch crown rests upon her brow—alive, breathing, sovereign.

She does not advance. She does not retreat.

She simply is.

I feel it then—the way the room shifts around her, the way even rough men lower their voices without knowing why. Power does that. So does grief carried with dignity.

Gandalf steps forward, pleased as ever with his own timing.

“Thorin Oakenshield,” he announces, “allow me to present Eärwa Singollo, High Queen of the Teleri, Sovereign of Taur Im Duinath—restored in strength, with aid and counsel to offer.”

He has no idea.

Not a damned clue.

I look to Thorin.

His hand tightens reflexively around the dwarrowdam beside him before he seems to realize what he’s done. His face drains of color. His eyes lock forward, fixed on the woman in the doorway like he’s seeing a ghost given flesh.

The dwarrowdam follows his gaze.

Her expression changes—slowly, sharply—as understanding dawns.

Then her mouth twists.

“Well,” she mutters, far too loud, “who let that tall Elven wench in here? This ain’t a place for her kind.”

The words land like a slap.

I don’t look at the dwarrowdam. I look at her.

And I see it.

The stillness that tightens too quickly. The hurt that flashes before it’s buried. The discipline that comes from centuries of holding one’s spine straight through loss.

Elves don’t love the way we do.

They wait.

They endure.

I’ve seen it in Thranduil—how a king can love once and never reach for another. How devotion does not fade, only deepens. I know what it means when one of them gives their heart.

And Thorin—

By Mahal.

He didn’t even last a week.

Something in my chest goes hard and sharp, like stone cracking under frost.

I stand.

The bench scrapes back loud enough to make half the tavern flinch.

“Gandalf,” I say, my voice cutting clean through the room, “get her out of here.”

The wizard turns, startled. “Dwalin—?”

“This is cruel,” I growl. “You didn’t mean it to be, but it is. And I’ll not have her stand there and watch this.”

The silence is absolute now.

I turn to Thorin at last.

He still hasn’t looked away from her.

“This,” I say, low and unforgiving, “is the one thing I’ve never respected you for.”

His jaw tightens.

“You knew how they love,” I continue. “You knew how long they wait. And you still sat there.”

Balin exhales slowly behind me. He understands.

The dwarrowdam shifts, suddenly unsure, her hand slipping from Thorin’s sleeve.

I step forward—not toward Thorin, but placing myself squarely between her and the rest of the room. A wall of stone where none existed a moment ago.

“This ain’t council,” I mutter. “It ain’t diplomacy. It’s a wound.”

And I will not stand by while she bleeds for our mistakes.