Chapter 28

When it was getting late, the dwarves had bid the Dainson siblings good-night as Maia gathered up a sleeping Lori, while Kyle followed a step behind, feeling today's training starting to catch up to them with exhaustion.

Neither of them said a word about what had transpired in the middle of their campout dinner, since neither one were certain that it had been a voice that had whispered in their minds. It could have been fatigue, or maybe the dwarves put something in the sausage that made them start hearing things (which immediately sounded ridiculous, even to little Lori). Or maybe it had simply been their imagination. A side-effect of the great magic surrounding Rivendell, possibly.

All of them, without saying a word to one another, thought the same thing: they would have to ask Gandalf in the morning.

Later that night, Maia was laying quietly in the large bed with Lori cuddled next to her, sleeping silently. Her eyes were closed, trying to meditate herself into sleep, but her thoughts were full of her time with Fili that afternoon. A deep flush heated her cheeks, her mouth twitching into a tiny smile, tightening to hold back a bubbly giggle as she recalled how deeply they had kissed. Her toes curled under the covers as she remembered how warm and well-structured his body had been when he pressed her to the earth, fitting well with her own body as he slid his hands over the curves of her torso before they would brush across her fallen hair. Her tongue had locked with his own, his beard tickling her chin as she tilted back her neck when feeling his-

Maia Dainson.

Maia's eyes popped open with a gasp. Staring at the ceiling with wide eyes, she lay there with a pounding heart, wondering if she had actually heard...

Maia...

Maia slowly sat up. She could hear her own breath increasing with nervousness as she stared toward the shadowy corners, half-expecting something or someone to step out and reveal themselves.

Was she actually hearing this? Who was speaking? Was this actually coming from her head? Was that what the tingling in the very core of her nerves was? Like they were not only speaking to her, but attempting to lure her out of bed with an invisible thread of a pleasant, eerie seduction.

Your presence is wanted this night.

Who is this? she dared to think, trembling while struggling to hold back her panic. She was not even sure if the voice would answer back. She was almost positive that she was dreaming...or that she was going crazy.

Testing this theory, she pinched her arm hard and winced. No change.

The feeling became more soothing. Her tremors began to calm, while the voice whispered as though breathing in her ear, Follow my voice. All three of you. Come forth in the presence of those who gather, so that I may look upon your faces with my own eyes.

Presence of….who?

But...where are you? Her thoughts were soft and unsure. Who are you?

Come find me. That was all the voice said, but somehow the presence in her mind never left.

"Maia?" The older girl looked down to see Lori sitting up, rubbing her sleepy brown eyes as she looked up at her sister in question. "Are you okay?"

"Y-Yeah….I think so."

"Who was that talking?"

Maia stared down at her in shock. "You heard it, too?" Lori nodded in confirmation. "And...do you have this...feeling, right now?"

It was a gentle, but overwhelming presence, reminding her very much of the vibrations that surrounded Gandalf, but this one seemed more in control, more graceful and ominous…like an ocean. Calm and peaceful in the stillness, but still capable of creating powerful, crushing waves in a building thunderstorm. Somehow it gave Maia the feeling that it had far more power than Gandalf ever had. Maia was not sure whether she should be amazed or terrified of this hold over her, but her instincts were telling her to just get out of bed and obey.

"Mm-hm," Lori nodded again. She didn't look as freaked out as Maia felt, which amazed the older girl. "Are we gonna follow the voice, Maia?" she whispered. "She said she wants to meet us, didn't she?"

"'She…?'" whispered Maia, but suddenly realized that Lori was probably right. The voice was deep and silky, ageless and full of superiority, but within its lilt seemed to ring like it belonged to a woman. It had been hard to concentrate on distinguishing the voice when too busy trying to comprehend that someone was talking inside her head. It was beyond freaky.

Staying put in the wide, open-spaced bedroom suddenly felt suffocatingly small. Brushing aside the covers, she swung her legs over the edge of the bed and hopped to her feet on the cold marble floor, before holding out a hand to her sister. "Come on," she told Lori, who immediately obeyed and crawled across the mattress to follow her.

Maia wasn't sure whether this was a good idea, but she was definitely not going to get any sleep if the voice kept calling out to both her and her sister all night like some daunting spirit from a horror show scoop.

When she and Lori left the room, both still barefoot and in their pajamas, Maia felt as though her feet were working for her, like her body knew where to go when her mind didn't. An image flashed in her mind very briefly of a silver pathway crossing a running river, leading up to a large, white pavilion. She remembered that walkway. It hadn't been too far from where the dwarves' chambers took place. Maybe that was where the voice was leading them?

Should they tell someone first?

Lori clung onto Maia's arm with both hands, half burying her little face nervously. Her hand found her baby sister's tiny ones and squeezed comfortingly in response as they continued on at a slow pace through the shadowy halls lined with pillars and archways, all of which were lit only by the blue-silver glow of the moonlight. As though gliding through a dream.

Maybe this is a dream, Maia began to think. Maybe I drifted off at some point and I'm sleepwalking, thinking Lori's right next to me. S'not as if I hadn't walked around in my sleep before. It had happened quite a few times when she was younger, but the last time she had been told to have sleepwalked was a few months ago. She couldn't even remember what the dream was about, but it had felt really weird, like breathing underwater with no sense of direction or awareness.

They were just turning around a corner towards the open arch that led outside when a figure moved from the shadows from a nearby passage of stairs. Lori yelped, causing Maia to jump back in shock…before recognizing it was Kyle, who had also gave a start. She placed a hand over her pounding chest and let out a breath. "God, Ky! Are you trying to give us a heart attack?" she hissed toward Kyle.

"Keep your pants on, will ya?" Kyle hissed back, also annoyed. "You almost did the same to me, you know. What are y'all doing here?"

"What are you doing here?"

Kyle became unsure for a moment, before answering hesitantly, "Call me crazy, but..."

"You heard the voice, too?" Lori spoke up. Kyle looked at her in shock, then nodded.

"Yeah!" Kyle looked up at Maia with wide eyes. "Did you?"

She nodded. "Yeah."

"From earlier, too?"

"Yep."

"What the hell!"

"I know."

"Do you think we should go?" whispered Kyle frantically. "What if it's a trap? Like some kind of spooky Jedi force that takes control of your minds or whatever?"

Maia shook her head, feeling as though this whole thing couldn't get any stranger than now. As much she thought Star Wars was cool, including all the powers of a Jedi making her inner-nerd leap with excitement, to actually experience something even remotely close to telekinesis was entirely a different story.

"I don't think we have much of a choice," she said, though sounding unsure herself. "Whoever is doing this, I would prefer to meet them in person and just get it over with so they won't bother us anymore. Besides, it doesn't feel like we're in danger."

"Exactly! It could be a trick," said Kyle.

"Or maybe she really could help us," suggested Lori, looking up in between them hopefully. "Maybe she knows things that we don't."

Maia and Kyle both stared down at her, speechless. Their five year-old sister actually had a point. Never once did it cross their minds that the person whose voice was powerful enough to enter their minds at such a distance could have real knowledge that even Gandalf didn't have. Knowledge of how they could get home. And more.

"Well," Maia whispered. She shrugged with one shoulder before glancing at her brother. "If you put it that way…."

"I'm in," agreed Kyle, although still looked uncertain. "Still smells fishy, though."

"Like I said, we may not have much of a choice."

All in agreement, though not without the strong sense of foreboding chill in their bones that instinctually rose with their suspicions, the Dainson siblings huddled close and continued on together through the Elven city in slow, unsure steps.

They had no idea where this path would lead them in the middle of the night until they found themselves walking across a bridge that led up a turn of steps crossing the valley, reaching a large pavilion that loomed over the waterfalls. Voices could be heard, muffled and distinct, one them they instantly recognized as Gandalf's with his gruff, widened sound.

As they approached, the narrow archway seemed to widen up toward the night sky, displaying a brilliant blue and silver hue of the moon and stars over the valley beyond the river. A cylinder platform of alabaster stone stretched from the winding steps between the circle of pillars supporting the dome-shaped pavilion, wrapped in green and gold vines blossomed with various colored flowers, whereas in its center rested a white cylinder-shaped table of the same stone.

Occupying that table, or near that table, were four people. Two of those people were Gandalf and Elrond. The other two...

"We have company," spoke the golden-haired woman, her voice rich and deep.

Together the elders had turned in unison.

The Dainson siblings froze, limbs stiffening like stone, caught under the scrutiny of the present council. Maia can feel Lori clutching her yoga pants, while Kyle, who had been walking a step ahead, inched slightly closer back to his sisters, his jaw clenched and gray-blue eyes round with wariness, though also betraying the spark of wonder that she also felt.

Their gazes were first drawn to the woman, whose very image and presence seemed to pull them in like a strong current easing into a gentle flow.

Embroidered in a slim white gown of feathery lace and translucent designs crossing the pearly hems of her skirts and long flowing sleeves, the woman was in every way tall and fair in both face and hair, which was very long and wavy under a thin crown of braids, flowing like bright, silvery seams of pale golden yellow that seemed to glow like a cool beacon under the moonlight, much like the rest of her figure. Her cheekbones were high and strong on her narrowly oval face, smooth as porcelain like her chin and brow, which was crowned in a silver diadem entwined in a downward angular shape (nearly similar to Elrond's bronze circlet), though the curved lines of her eyebrows were darker and her lips a rosy shade of pink, contrasting beautifully with the ocean blue color in her feline eyes. Those eyes which, out of everything else about her, seemed to be the most alluring. Beautiful and jewel-like, each alit with sparks of silvery light from her pupils as soft and piercing as the distant stars in the night…but distant they were, far-seeing and burdened with untold years of wisdom that betrayed her actual age within her youthful beauty.

With her pointed ears peaking out from the flowing strands of her hair, it was already obvious that she was an elf. But gazing upon her magnificence, feeling the power in her radiate from her being with such compelling, musical vibrations that were more powerful (and not quite similar) than either Gandalf's or Elrond's, the human siblings with dropped jaws and wide eyes wondered in breathtaking awe that they were literally looking at a mythical goddess.

The elleth smiled.

It was both heartwarming and unnerving, like she knew exactly what was going on in their heads and it amused her. As if she could read their...

Wait a minute!

"Ah," Gandalf smiled in greeting, though not entirely without a hint of surprise, "you three! All together? This is quite a pleasant surprise! But how did-" Then realization seemed to dawn his face, before he turned to look at the lady, who shared a brief glance with him by a mere flicker of her eyes. "Oh…I see. But, this couldn't wait until morning, my lady?"

"Sleep will not claim them this night," she spoke calmly, smoothly. Then her eyes glanced back over a them. "Their hearts are heavy with many questions, for answers that have yet to fill a void long forsaken."

"So this is they whom have disturbed the tidings of the void," spoke the other man from the far side of the pavilion. Like the lady, he too was tall and garbed in pure white robes of linen and silk, but he was in no way youthful with his gauntly aged face, black eyes, beak-like nose, and long snow-white hair and beard. In his hand was a tall white staff. Like Gandalf, there was a power that radiated from his being, but stronger and more intimidatingly severe.

To put it shortly, the whole pavilion was a combination of buzzing, mentally overwhelming power, as though settled from their full potential and merely stirred with a gradually rising tension. All four, two elves and two wizards, were very powerful people gathered together, fully capable to commanding and smiting an army with a wave of their hands if they were given the opportunity. And Maia, Kyle, and Lori were standing in the middle of it.

"Wait! That was you?" Maia blurted out toward the woman, once the speaker's voice was set right in her memory. "You called us here? Who are you?" She glanced at each of their faces cautiously. "What is this?"

Gandalf stepped forward, his smile ever gracious and knowing.

"Maia, Kyle, and Lori Dainson," he spoke, and turned his head in a gesture towards the woman and old man. "I would like to introduce to you the Lady Galadriel of Lothlorien, the mightiest of her kin. And this is Saruman the White, the Head of our Order, and of the five Itari, for which I am a part of."

While the Lady Galadriel's smile was genuine, yet filled with so much unspoken wisdom, Saruman the White placid look remained sharp and scrutinizing, as if looking down on them from the hooked beak that was his nose.

"You three," he said in a low tone, "have been the cause of much trouble, it seems."

Kyle was on edge.

Seated on a bench right next to his sisters minutes later, hands gripping together to keep from wringing nervously, his wary gray-blue eyes were on the white wizard. And the white wizard's strangely fathomless black eyes were staring right back, with twice as cold an expression than the young teen could ever pull.

Unlike Gandalf, though besides the powerful aura that clearly surrounded his being with more volume, Kyle got bad vibes from the old man. He vaguely reminded him of his stiff-backed vice principal. He didn't have long white hair or a long white beard (he was bald, in fact), but he too had cold black eyes and large, beak-like nose that would peer down on others with calculation and judgement, much in a way this 'Head of the Order' white wizard named Saruman was doing to Kyle and his sisters now. Someone who demanded order and respect, or else there would be hell to pay when you least expected it. A sophisticated bully in disguise.

So for some reason, after just one look at him, Kyle did not like this man. But what he really didn't get was why nobody else seemed to share his opinion…or more importantly, why couldn't he share theirs? Maybe he was just being biased, though his dad always used to say he had a nose for these type of things.

And then there was the matter of the elf woman. This beautiful, mysterious elleth whose deep, silky voice affluently slipped into his mind like a stream of water flowing through an open channel. Smooth, soothing, yet forceful and unstoppable. It was true that she looked nothing less than a goddess, and that behind the radiant complexion of her smooth pale cheeks and liquid blue gaze bore the groundless weight of intellectual wisdom that stretched beyond all the combined years of the other individuals occupying her presence.

Yet Kyle was convinced that she was tricky. That alone became a reason to also distrust her, whatever her own may be for luring them here.

She was likely the most dangerous person among them.

"You wonder why you are here." It wasn't a question, but a statement. The Lady of Light had proven so far to be nothing if not conclusive, in a prophetic sense.

They were seated across from the white-clad elleth with a brim air of tense resolution. The siblings, while sensing that the woman meant them no genuine harm, anticipated a certain domino effect that the upcoming exchange would bring. And hopefully one with not too much mind-talk. They still couldn't fully wrap their heads (no pun intended) around such a proven possibility.

Lori was the first to speak. "Did you really speak in our heads?" Galadriel smiled in response. The little girl gasped aloud. "How do you do that?" she squeaked breathlessly.

"Lori," muttered Maia. She didn't want the little girl to encourage the topic. She would rather stick to the good, old-fashioned talk where everyone spoke and their thoughts were left in private. Or were they still in private? She looked at Galadriel. "Sorry, but if it's all the same to you, whatever you have to say to us, could you, erm, keep it so that we can speak face to face?" She waved a hand between them as a gesture. s

I second that, thought Kyle, but then winced when he realized Galadriel might have heard that.

"As you wish," said Galadriel with a bob of her head. "Though I implore that you not hold back any questions you need answers to. Mithrandir has done much in your favor, but I fear he too knows little of your own occurrence." Gandalf tilted his head in reluctant acknowledgement, clearing his throat a little. Saruman's bushy eyebrows merely twitched up a notch, but otherwise made no sound. Elrond was silently watching on the other side, leaning against a pillar with one arm folded and the other hand rubbing his jaw with deep foreboding, grey eyes darkened with knowledge left with gaps of similar confusion. Like he suspected something, but looked to the White Lady to confirm it.

"What do you mean?" Asked Maia. "Before, you..." Her brow furrowed. "You called us 'children of the…'" She trailed off, trying to remember the word. "Dunedain?"

Dunedain. The word lingered and tucked at Kyle's conscience like a forgotten memory. Something about the word––the name––seemed distinctly familiar to him. Like he heard it spoken before, but can't recall where or when. But...

It was Lori, timidly sitting in between her brother and sister on the white pavilion bench, her little legs dangling and her tiny hands folded, her big brown eyes wide with innocent curiosity, who asked the big question.

"What's a Dunedain?"

To Be Continued...

Hiyah, folks! Back from the endless depths of the real world, where the combination of a job and family is time-consuming, and finding a new job (still) is even more so! What I wouldn't give to escape to Middle-earth right now!

Today is a member of my family's birthday, so it felt like a good day to update! There's also Sasuke Uchiha and Daniel Radcliffe (best known for his character, Harry Potter:), whom we can also wish a Happy Birthday! July 23rd is just one of those special days, right?

I know that it's been some time since Christopher Lee passed away, but I'm still sad about it. His character Saruman is what I best know him for, but he has played in so many good roles (especially the bad guy roles) that it's truly fun writing about him. And I also looked forward to introducing Galadriel:) The next chapter will be interesting, indeed. This one was meant to be longer, I swear, but… *sigh*

Anyway, I apologize for the long delay, but I guess it's safe to say I put the story On Hold while working on "Forever My Heart" and some of "Light in the Shadows," which are also still in-progress. And then there are non-fanfiction stories I'm working on, so hopefully those will be done soon...

Thank you for the reviews, follows, and favorites! I'm glad to know that there are still interested readers out there, and I will do my best to drill forward. Hope to hear your thoughts on this:)