Rain runs down the plates of my armor, carrying blood that is not all my own. The horn of Helm’s Deep has sounded twice; the walls shake with every strike from the enemy’s ladders. I draw again and again, arrows hissing into the dark, until the quiver feels lighter than air.

A flash of movement below—silver, not steel—catches my eye.

At first I think it only torchlight on armor, but then the torch turns and the light stays. Moon-silver. A banner I have not seen since the Greenwood was green: the sigil of Taur Im Duinath, the living rivers entwined beneath a crescent moon. And beneath it, leading the charge—You.

Not the child who used to stumble through drills beneath my bow. Not the princess who laughed when she missed her mark. A queen now, every motion clean, decisive, sure. Your spear arcs through the rain like a stroke of light.

For a heartbeat the battle falls away. All I hear is the drum of the rain on stone and the echo of years.

You should not be here. This is not your war.

My oath to Lothlórien binds me to the Lady and to this field, not to your realm. And yet every arrow I loose feels as if it’s meant to keep the path clear for your feet.

A Rohirrim cries out beside me; I pull him back, answer with my blade, but my eyes keep finding you across the chaos. The years between us collapse with every heartbeat.

When the horn sounds again and the enemy breaks for a moment, you turn—just once—toward the wall. Through rain and smoke our gazes meet. You still. So do I.

I lower my bow. You incline your head—barely more than a breath of movement—but it’s enough to unmake the distance of centuries.

And then the next wave comes.