The tavern door groans as I force it open, letting in a knife-edge of winter before the fire takes me in. Smoke hangs over the room like a low ceiling; the air tastes of old ale and burned oak. I ignore the noise, the shouting, the dice. My eyes go instead to the grey hat and staff in the corner.

Gandalf watches me as I sit across from him, mail and leather settling heavily around my shoulders.

“You look worn,” he says.

“I am,” I answer. “But you did not summon me here to comment on my face. Say his name.”

“Smaug.”

The sound of it hits harder than the wind outside. For a moment, all I hear is the crackle of the hearth.

“You cannot reclaim Erebor alone,” he continues. “Not with the numbers you have. Not with the allies you refuse to seek.”

“I have my own people.”

“And too much of your grandfather’s voice in your head,” he replies. “You carry Thrór’s anger, Thráin’s grief, and call it honour.”

“They were wronged,” I say.

“So were many,” Gandalf answers. “But you are not Thrór. You are not Thráin. You are a living man, and you cling to bitterness belonging to the dead.”

My jaw tightens. “If I do not remember their pain, who will?”

“Remembering is not living inside it,” he says sharply. “You let old grudges decide whom you may trust, whom you may stand beside. You let ghosts steer you.”

I breathe once, slow and tight.

“What do you want of me?”

“There is an ally your line rejected before they even considered her,” Gandalf says. “Not because she was unworthy, but because Thrór preferred his grudges over new bonds.”

“Who?”

He looks at me steadily. “The Queen of Taur Im Duinath.”

I still. I have heard the name—moonlit banners, white birch crowns, a realm that stood firm while others fell. Even dwarves who dislike Elves speak of her with reluctant respect.

“My grandfather would spit at the thought,” I say.

“Your grandfather,” Gandalf answers, “is not the one walking freezing roads with no home. You are. And unless you mean to build your whole life out of his anger, stop pretending you’re chained to it.”

“You think I can simply put aside what I was taught?”

“I think you can choose what kind of man you will be,” he says. “You are not bound to the Mountain. Not to hatred. Not to old wounds. You are free to seek an ally who might change everything.”

“You speak as though she is destiny.”

“No,” he says softly. “I speak as though you are ready. Ready to build something that isn’t shaped by loss. Ready to stand beside someone powerful enough to challenge you, steady enough to anchor you, and wise enough to see who you are beneath the ashes.”

I look into the fire. It is a small thing compared to Erebor’s forges, yet it burns with a stubborn life.

“You think she would help me reclaim my kingdom?”

“I think she could be the turning point,” Gandalf replies. “For your people… and for you.”

His voice lowers. “And if you have the courage to admit more than strategy, she could be more than an ally.”

I glance up sharply. “You mean a marriage.”

“I mean,” he says, “that you have the right to choose a future not dictated by dead men. To bind your life to someone by your own will. To take a queen not for politics, but because you wish to stand beside her.”

I exhale slowly. Something shifts inside me—small, but real.

“I have nothing to offer her,” I murmur. “No gold. No throne.”

“Then offer the truth of yourself,” he says. “Your honour. Your endurance. Your heart, if you dare use it.”

Silence stretches.

Finally, I rise.

“Where are you going?” he asks.

“To stop living as if my life ended with a dragon’s landing,” I say. “And to see with my own eyes the queen you speak of.”

He nods, eyes bright beneath the brim of his hat. “Good. That is the first choice tonight that sounds like it is truly yours.”

The winter wind hits me as I step into the night, but it no longer feels empty. It feels like a path—one that does not lead back, but forward.

I walk toward the possibility of a woman I have never met, and the dangerous thought that my life might yet be more than what history made of me.