The mountain breathes wrong.

I feel it before the horns ever sound, before banners lift or bows are drawn. Stone does not shift without reason, not like this—not with the air pulled tight and strained, as if the valley itself has drawn a breath it has no intention of releasing.

Around me, Durin’s Folk still. The men quiet. Even the Elves across the field hold, green and gold ranks paused beneath the shadow of the Mountain. Thranduil’s host stands ready, a blade laid flat across the earth.

I do not look at them.

I look to the valley’s edge.

Something moves there—low, fast, deliberate. Not fog. Not weather. Motion with intent.

My grip tightens on the haft of my axe. I see it in Thorin’s posture, in the way Fili shifts his weight, in how Kíli’s mouth closes mid‑word. This is not battle approaching.

This is recognition.

The arrow comes first.

Red‑fletched.

It whistles through the air and strikes the ground before the Elvenking’s great white stag, burying itself deep in stone and earth alike. Close enough to be unmistakable. Far enough to be deliberate.

Not an attack.

A declaration.

Thranduil freezes.

Not in fear—but in knowing.

His gaze drops not to the arrowhead, but to the fletching. His breath catches, sharp and silent. For a heartbeat, the crown upon his brow seems too heavy for his neck.

I know that arrow.

My chest tightens hard enough to hurt.

No forge in Erebor made that shaft. No Elven hand bound those feathers. There is only one people who mark their warning so plainly—and only one who carries it with that kind of certainty.

Then the valley erupts.

A war cry rises—not one voice, but many. Raw. Native. Old. It rolls along the stone walls and crashes into the assembled armies like a living thing.

They come from the flanks of the valley, slipping from rock and ravine, ash‑skinned and painted in streaks of bright red that blaze against grey flesh. Bone and feather gleam. Spears and blades catch the light. They move with brutal coordination—no banners, no armor, no hesitation.

Avari.

Her people.

I bark a laugh that tears out of my chest before I can stop it, turning just enough for the Company to hear me. “She’s come,” I growl, pride thick in my voice. “That arrow? That war cry? That’s mine. That’s my mate—and the land itself answers her.”

They flood the ground before the Mountain, forming a living wall between Durin’s Folk and the Elven host.

She steps forward alone.

The war cries fall silent at once.

She reaches the arrow and strikes it with her spear, driving it deeper into the earth before the Elvenking’s stag. The animal rears, snorting, sensing what its rider already knows.

She bares her teeth.

The hiss she unleashes cuts through the valley like drawn steel.

“You tried to wipe the Avari from Middle‑Earth,” she says, her voice carrying without effort, sharp and unyielding. “For the rot buried in your dark soul, Thranduil Oropherion.”

The name lands like a blow.

“You will not do the same to my mate,” she continues, gaze snapping briefly—inevitably—toward the Mountain. “Nor to his people.”

At her signal, the Avari answer her words with a unified cry that rattles stone and bone alike.

Thranduil hesitates.

I see it.

He knows how they fight. He remembers the wars him and his father King Oropher fought for their land—wooden bows and make‑shift spears wielded with merciless precision. Brutal. Silent. Relentless.

I step forward before Thorin can stop me, laughter tearing free of my chest, fierce and proud, axe lowering to my side as I plant my feet upon the stone.

“That’s my mate!” I roar down into the valley.

The sound carries.

“And you point‑eared uzbad‑thrak,” I add, voice sharp with Khuzdûl fury, “you’ll lower that crown or choke on it.”

Her head turns just enough for me to know she’s heard.

Just enough.

Whatever comes next—war, reckoning, blood—will come through us first.

And none of them will take her from me.