When the rest of the Fellowship found Frodo's lifeless body, the sun was setting over Amon Hen, and the air was heavy with the scent of blood. Aragorn was the first to arrive at the scene. The sight he beheld was different from the grief he had felt in Moria; this was not grief, but the end itself. Frodo lay at the base of the Seat of Seeing, on that bloody stone, his eyes staring blankly at the sky. On his neck, where the chain had broken, was a bruised mark. Aragorn, as a Ranger, could read the muddy drama on the ground: he saw the signs of a struggle, how Boromir's heavy boots had torn the earth, and Frodo's small, desperate resistance. And then... other tracks. Uruk-hai. And following that... nothing. Legolas and Gimli reached the hilltop right behind him. Legolas gasped in pain when he saw the scene. His Elven-eyes could see Frodo's extinguished aura, that stolen light. But Gimli, the dwarf, collapsed at that moment. The loss of Gandalf had been a blow; what had happened now was a humiliation. "No," he moaned, his voice a wail. "The wee one... He was just a wee one. We... we couldn't protect him." Aragorn knelt beside Frodo. He closed his eyes. He placed his hand on the hobbit's cold forehead. "Rest in peace, Frodo Baggins," he whispered. "Your burden... your burden is over now." In that moment, the Ranger in Aragorn died. And the heavy, crushing burden of the king settled on his shoulders, right in the midst of his greatest defeat. "Boromir," Legolas said, his voice as sharp as a shard of ice. "Boromir did this. And he took the Ring. The tracks... like the tracks of something invisible... they lead east." "And the Uruks," Aragorn said, standing up. "They have taken Merry and Pippin. Their tracks lead west, to Saruman." There were three paths. East, to follow the Ring and Boromir—an impossible pursuit. West, to run and save the hobbits. Or south, to carry the news of their defeat. "We are broken," said Gimli, raising his axe. "The Fellowship is over. The quest has failed." "No," said Aragorn. His voice was deeper than it had ever been; in it was the steel of the kings of Númenor. "The quest has changed." He looked at Frodo. "We will commit him to the waters of the river. As my fathers did. His journey ends here." Then he turned west. "We will take back Merry and Pippin. Saruman will pay the price for this betrayal." They did not follow the Ring. They could not. It was outside their world now. The only thing left was vengeance, and perhaps that small, faint glimmer of hope: to save the other members of the Fellowship. They wrapped Frodo's body in one of the Elven-cloaks and laid him in one of the boats from Lórien, a sad relic of their failed quest. They placed his sword, Sting, beside him. In the evening darkness, they released the boat into the current of the Anduin. The boat drifted towards the thunder of the Falls of Rauros and disappeared from view. "For those who remain," said Aragorn, drawing his sword. "The Three Hunters. We go to Rohan." Thus, the remnants of the Fellowship began to run west, not after the Ring, but after the hobbits. But as they ran, the rest of the world had already awakened. The news spread faster than the wind. It came not from the tongues of birds, but from the groan of the earth itself. In Lothlórien, Galadriel knelt before her mirror. She did not see Frodo's boat fall from the cascade, but she saw Boromir's passage through Cirith Ungol. She felt Denethor's fall from the Tower. She felt that dark will radiating from his tower, that new, terrible being. And for the first time in thousands of years, the Lady of the Wood wept in helplessness. In Mirkwood, in Thranduil's halls, the roots of the trees trembled. In the Iron Hills, Dáin II Ironfoot had heard the echo from Moria. And now, he felt the ominous wind coming from the north. Even in Imladris, in the sheltered valley of the Last Homely House, the air had changed. The halls, normally filled with song, grew silent. The waters of the River Bruinen flowed louder than usual, as if announcing a mourning. And there was one who felt this corruption, this shadow, more clearly than anyone. On the highest floor of his library, Elrond was not looking at a map of the stars, but at the fate of Middle-earth. As a half-elf, he carried both the sorrow of Men and the wisdom of Elves. He felt the moment Frodo fell. He felt the moment Boromir took the Ring. And he felt how the Captain of Gondor, with that Ring, had transformed into the Corrupted One, the moment he entered the throne room of Minas Tirith. Elrond's face turned to stone, thousands of years old. He had seen the last battle of Gil-galad. He had seen Isildur's betrayal. But what had happened was darker than all of them; not a defeat, but a reversal. The enemy was no longer just a shadow in the east; it was inside the strongest fortress of the west. "Erestor," he said, his voice louder than the sound of the waterfalls filling the valley. "Call all the messengers. To Lórien. To Mirkwood. To the Grey Havens. To the Dwarves. Call everyone." "My lord," said Erestor, seeing the terrible expression on Elrond's face, "what... what has happened?" "The quest has failed," said Elrond, closing his eyes. "The Ringbearer is dead. The Ring has returned to Mordor. And Boromir, son of Denethor... is no longer himself." Elrond gathered all his will. This was a last call of hope. He called not only to his allies, but to them, too. His mind reached out, beyond the world, to the place from whence the Istari had come. The first to arrive was the unexpected one. Saruman. The White Wizard came galloping from the peak of Orthanc. When he arrived in Rivendell, his horse was covered in foam, and he himself looked exhausted and terrified. "Elrond!" he shouted, dismounting at the entrance to the valley. "A terrible mistake has been made!" Elrond met him at the entrance to the hall; on his face was neither welcome nor surprise, only icy judgment. "Saruman," he said calmly. "I know what you have done." Saruman's noble posture faltered for a moment. "I... what have I done?" "Your Uruks," said Elrond. "Amon Hen. The hobbits." "No!" Saruman shouted, his voice carrying convincing panic. "That was beyond my control! Lurtz... he defied my command! Sauron... Sauron's will has grown too strong, it clouded my mind. I was trying to save the Ring! I wanted to bring it to Isengard to keep it safe! But that halfling died, and that fool Boromir... he ruined everything!" Saruman fell to his knees before Elrond. His white robes were stained with mud. "Elrond, my friend," he pleaded. "Sauron has won. The Ring is in his grasp. Now... now we have only one choice. We must strike before he can gather his strength. My army is at your command. Isengard is the last fortress of the west. Together..." His words were cut off by a new voice echoing in the valley. "Your lies fall from you like a snake's skin, Curunír." Saruman froze. He slowly turned his head. At the entrance to the valley stood a figure in a grey cloak, but now glowing with a flame visible beneath it. Gandalf. But this was not the cheerful, grumpy old man the Fellowship knew; this was something that had returned from the fire of Moria and the bottomless water at the Foundations of the World. His hair and beard were no longer grey, but a mix of ash and white. His eyes... his eyes had seen the fire of the Balrog, and had taken some of that fire with them. "Mithrandir," Elrond whispered. "I am not him," said Gandalf, his voice a gravelly rasp. "He died on the Bridge of Khazad-dûm. I was sent back by Eru's last, angry will." "The Grey Flame," Saruman whispered, recoiling from the power of this new being. He recognized the power of Valinor. Gandalf walked towards him. With every step, the air around his staff (still his old, wooden staff, but now glowing like an ember from within) grew hotter. "Your Uruks," said Gandalf, stopping right in front of Saruman. "Your Palantír. Your betrayal. I have seen it all. You wanted the Ring for yourself." Saruman stood up, with one last shred of pride. "And what did you do, Gandalf? You could not defeat that fire! That Balrog still lives beneath Moria, doesn't it? You failed, too!" "Yes," said Gandalf calmly. "I failed. But I returned, accepting my failure. You are here to hide your own betrayal." Gandalf raised his staff. "You are no longer White, Saruman. You are no longer any color. You are..." "Stop!" Elrond's voice cut through the tension between the two wizards. "We do not have time to fight! Saruman, you have betrayed us. And your betrayal has sealed Sauron's victory. Now you have only one path: Help us. Or face the wrath of the Grey Flame, here." Saruman looked at Gandalf. In those ember-eyes, he saw no mercy, only fire. Then he looked at Elrond. He was trapped. "That... Being," he hissed, accepting defeat. "The Corrupted One in Minas Tirith, he will destroy Isengard as well. I have no other choice." At that moment, another figure emerged from the woods. His brown robes were in tatters, and he had birds' nests in his hair. Radagast. "They've come!" he shouted, his eyes wide with terror. "Don't you hear it? It's not thunder! It's the sound of wings!" "What wings, Radagast?" said Elrond. "From the North!" Radagast shrieked, his voice trembling. "Cold! The ancient one! The breath from under the ice! The sleeping cold-fire of Forodwaith! The scream in Moria... the echo... it woke him! He is coming south!" Those in the hall froze for a moment under the weight of this new, terrible news. Saruman's face lost its arrogant expression, replaced by pure understanding. "A Dragon," he whispered. Gandalf looked at him, the embers in his eyes flaring. "Not just a dragon. An Ice Dragon. A calamity from the time of Angmar." The hall of the palace fell silent under the weight of this new-found knowledge. The Ring was in Mordor. Gondor had fallen. Saruman was a traitor. And an Ice Dragon was flying south. "The Ents," said Radagast, breathlessly. "The Ents have awakened, too. They were angry about Saruman's tree-felling in Isengard. But now... now, they are angry at the plague spreading from Osgiliath. The grass dies where he walks, Brother. The Ents... the Ents are marching." "To where?" said Gandalf. "They don't know," said Radagast. "They are just angry. This anger... it might lead them to Isengard, to your fortress, Saruman." Saruman's face went white. The gathering was not one of hope, but of desperation. Elrond's hall was filled with the last allies coming together. The calm air of Rivendell had given way to a feverish preparation for war. Glorfindel and Elrond's sons, Elladan and Elrohir, were gathering elven-warriors from the north. At that very moment of crisis, Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli arrived in the valley. When Aragorn entered Elrond's hall, his eyes found Gandalf first. For a moment, it was as if the joy from before Moria had returned. "Gandalf!" But when Gandalf turned to him, Aragorn hesitated. This was not his friend. This was a weapon returned from the fire. "Mithrandir...?" "Your burden has grown heavy, Aragorn," said Gandalf, silencing the hall with his voice. "We know that Frodo is dead." Gimli saw Gandalf at that moment. "You!" roared the Dwarf, with rage and grief. "You abandoned him! You abandoned all of us! And he... that halfling... he's dead!" "Yes, he is dead," said Gandalf. "And I died, too, Son of Glóin. But our war is not over." Aragorn turned to Elrond. "Is there news from Minas Tirith?" Elrond's gaze said it all. "Minas Tirith has fallen. Denethor is dead. The Corrupted One is in the White Tower." Aragorn's knees trembled. In that moment, that last hope was extinguished. "No." A voice came from the corner of the hall. A figure Aragorn had not noticed before, standing in the shadows. He wore the green-and-brown cloak of the Rangers of Ithilien, his face etched with grief and exhaustion. "Gondor... Gondor has not yet completely fallen." Faramir stepped forward. He had fled that terrible encounter in Osgiliath, and come north, seeking help. "My brother... he is no longer my brother," said Faramir, his voice trembling. "He is in the Tower. He is not gathering his armies. He is waiting. He is looking into the Palantír. There are still... there are still those loyal to me, deep within the city. There is resistance." In that moment, the absolute despair in the hall gave way to something else. A grim, cold determination. "The Council," said Elrond, standing up. "This is our plan. We can no longer destroy the Ring. We can no longer besiege Mordor. We can only... buy time." Gandalf turned to the map in the hall. "And our enemy is no longer just Sauron. He has divided his strength. His Emissary is in Gondor. The Ice Dragon is in the North. And the Balrog... the Balrog is still in Moria, feeding on the power of that echo." Elrond's eyes glinted. "If he is divided... so shall we be." He looked at Aragorn. "You must go south with Faramir. You must call the Army of the Dead, Aragorn. You must retake Gondor. You must separate That Being from his master. You must draw that Corrupted Captain out of Minas Tirith." Then he turned to Gandalf. "You, Grey Flame... you must take on the most difficult task." Gandalf nodded, the embers in his eyes glowing. "Moria. I must finish that fire." Gimli stepped forward. "You will not go alone, Wizard. It is Durin's Bane. And I am of Durin's folk. This time... this time I will not leap." Legolas joined them. "The remnants of the Fellowship fight together." "And we," said Saruman, trying to find his voice, "Radagast and I... will hold Isengard against the Dragon. And against the Ents..." Gandalf turned to him. "No, Saruman. You will face the Dragon. That will be your penance. Radagast will lead the Ents... to Minas Tirith, upon that Ruin." Elrond looked at the last, desperate alliance in the hall. Elves, Dwarves, Men... and Wizards at odds with each other. "From the East," said Elrond, as a final note. "I have also sent messengers to Khand and Rhûn. I have received... a signal... from the Blue Wizards, for the first time in thousands of years." But no one could rejoice at this. The war was at their doorstep. "The Ashes of the Fellowship," said Aragorn, gripping the hilt of his sword. "For Frodo. And for everyone who lives." That last gathering in Rivendell had given birth not to an army of hope, but to a shattered line of defense, established to delay the end of the world. The thing coming from the North was not a storm, but the death of storms. The Ice Dragon, awakened from its icy grave in Forodwaith, was flying south with a single purpose: to find that echo, that call of a rival power, of that fire, and to extinguish it. Its flight was silent; its massive, crystalline wings did not cut the air, they froze it. Behind it, it left a trail in the sky of frozen clouds that looked black as they blocked the sunlight. As it approached the peaks of the Misty Mountains, nature was the first to react. The peak of Caradhras, despite it being the last days of summer, was suddenly covered in a frost never seen before. The mountain goats, sensing this sharp, supernatural cold, fled in terror to the lower passes. The wind cut its usual mountain howl and was replaced by a high-pitched, thin silence, like the screeching of glass. The dragon began to circle over the three peaks where Moria was located (Barazinbar, Zirakzigil, and Bundushathûr). It was sniffing like a hunter; not the air, but the energy. And it found what it was looking for. Beneath the mountain. Down below, in the sad valley before the East-gate of Moria, in Dimrill Dale (Nanduhirion), the first contact was made. The wave of absolute zero radiating from the dragon's presence descended on the valley like an avalanche. The Mirrormere, that ancient lake that reflected the stars, reacted. Its surface first misted over, then, from the edges to the center, it began to freeze with an audible CRACK. This was not a normal freezing. The reflection in the lake's depths, the starlight that formed Durin's Crown, was trapped beneath the ice, and as the ice layer thickened, that ancient reflection shattered. The surface of the Mirrormere turned into a dead, blindingly white mirror, formed of a thousand cracks. The grass in the valley instantly froze, turned black, and crumbled to dust. The dragon fixed its massive, ice-blue eyes not on the frozen lake, but on the peak of the mountain beyond it, Zirakzigil. The fire was there. It was rising. In the deepest pits of Moria, the Balrog had rested and changed since destroying the Watcher. Its battle with Gandalf and the abyssal cold water that followed had extinguished its physical fire. But this had not weakened it; on the contrary, it had concentrated it. It was no longer just Durin's Bane; it was a pure shadow of Morgoth's will, an "Awakened" Maiar. The fire had been replaced by a darker, hotter, spiritual energy; the essence of hatred and shadow. And it was climbing. Not up the Endless Stair after Gandalf, but into the very veins of the mountain, the cracks in the world's foundations that the dwarves had not dug. Its purpose was the peak where Gandalf had met his fate: Zirakzigil, where Durin's Tower stood, to emerge into the clean air, to rule the sky once more. And then, it felt the cold. It was not the cold of the underground lake it had fallen into; this was the master of that cold. The existential opposite of its being. The other "experiment." Morgoth's other, failed child. Within the Balrog, something awoke that it had not felt in millennia: Competition. It quickened its ascent; it was no longer hiding. The peak of Zirakzigil, that snowy, sharp point above the clouds, suddenly began to tremble. The snow did not melt; it vaporized. The ancient stone beneath it first glowed red, then softened. And then, the peak of the mountain exploded with a massive internal pressure. As the ruins of Durin's Tower were thrown into the sky, pure, black smoke first erupted from the hole, like a volcano. From within the smoke, the Balrog rose. It was no longer the fiery beast from the bridge; it was a ten-meter-tall, humanoid void. Its body was a solidified shadow that swallowed the light around it, and within that shadow, an inner fire burned like the heart of a furnace, a molten magma red. In its hand was not a sword of flame, but a dark whip, formed of pure hatred. It climbed to the peak and roared; its roar was like a pressure wave from the bottom of the ocean. And right in front of it, in the sky, it saw the other being, waiting for it. Ice and Fire, face to face on the roof of the world. Two ancient beings, born from the will of the same dark master, but two completely opposite forces. For a moment, the world fell silent. The dragon hung suspended in the sky; its massive, crystalline wings broke the faint sunlight into a thousand cold, blue glimmers. Its presence froze the air around it. The Balrog stood on the peak of the mountain; its body melted the stone around it. The confrontation began in a single instant. The dragon made the first move. It roared and unleashed its breath. It was not a breath of fire, but a breath of nothingness. The Ice Dragon vomited the power of the absolute void of Helcaraxë onto the Balrog, like a storm. It was not a snowstorm, but the air itself freezing. The mountain peak where the Balrog stood instantly crystallized under that breath. The stone took on a structure as hard as diamond, but just as brittle. The Balrog's shadow-body was instantly covered in a layer of frozen rime. But the Balrog was not just a physical being. The Maiar fire within its shadow-body, that inner hatred, cracked the ice layer from within. CRRRACK! The Balrog roared and cracked its dark whip. The whip flew through the air and struck the dragon's wing. Fire touched ice. It was not a melting, but an explosion. The collision of two opposing elements created not a physical explosion, but a tear in reality. The peak of Zirakzigil, in that instant, literally ceased to exist. The sky burned with an impossible mixture of white and black. The shockwave of the explosion vibrated the entire range of the Misty Mountains like a bell. The dragon shrieked in pain. The crystalline wing that the whip had touched was cracked. The Balrog roared in fury. The ice-breath had wounded its shadow-form. Neither beast was using strategy anymore; it was a war of pure, primal annihilation. The Balrog leaped from the mountain peak. It left the molten rock and jumped into the air, onto the dragon. Its aim was to tear out that heart of ice with its own shadow-fire. The dragon was waiting for this move and dived down from the air with its massive body. Sky and earth met above the mountain, at the center of that explosion. The Balrog latched onto the dragon's neck. Its shadow-body clung to the dragon's icy scales like acid. The dragon's scales began to melt, to vaporize, under that Maiar fire. The dragon shrieked; its voice was the sound of a thousand glasses breaking at once. But the dragon, even in death, was a weapon. The moment the Balrog clung to it, it made its final move. It was no longer breathing. It was no longer fighting. The dragon released the essence of its being, the absolute zero energy it had stored within itself for millennia, at a single point: its own body. It was a suicide attack. "Absolute Zero." This did not mean cold; it meant the cessation of movement. At an atomic level. The dragon's body, in that moment, became the center of that energy. And the Balrog... the Balrog was attached to that body. The Maiar fire within the shadow-form, that "secret fire," met this new, impossible power. The fire tried to freeze. But fire cannot freeze. Movement tried to stop. But the Maiar will cannot stop. The Balrog's shadow-body shattered between these two impossibilities. The Ice Dragon, attached to it, released its final energy, and its body could not withstand the pressure of its own power. It was caught between the Balrog's fire and its own cold. Its crystalline scales first cracked. Then, they exploded with an inner light. The Ice Dragon exploded in the sky like a supernova, shattering into billions of crystalline, razor-sharp shards of ice. It was not a death, but a dispersal. The ice shards spread over Middle-earth as the seeds of a supernatural snowstorm that would reach even as far south as Gondor. The dragon was gone. But it had taken the Balrog with it. The dragon's final "Absolute Zero" attack had... stopped... the Balrog's shadow-form, that fire. The Balrog remained suspended in the air. Still in that roaring pose. Its whip still in the air. But it was not moving. Its shadow-body was no longer a shadow; it had turned into a frozen statue of obsidian. The magma-red fire within it no longer glowed; it was trapped inside the statue, like frozen blood. The Balrog was turned to stone. The massive, frozen statue hung for a moment in the void left by the dragon's explosion. Then, gravity noticed the weight of the frozen Maiar. And the statue fell. It fell thousands of meters from the shattered peak of Zirakzigil, down into the heart of Moria, into the chasm of the Endless Stair. THUD! It struck the foundations of the world. The energy released by the simultaneous destruction of two ancient powers in the same place was the final, massive tremor that cracked the veins of the world. Not a simple earthquake, but the trembling of reality itself. In Rivendell, Elrond felt the stones of the valley moan and understood what Gandalf had set out to face. In Isengard, Saruman, looking into his Palantír, felt the tower shake from its foundation and, for the first time, feared the power of the Ice Dragon. And in Gondor... In Minas Tirith, at the very top of the Tower of Ecthelion, Mardûn did not take his eyes off the Palantír. The stone orb was not showing his master's Eye, but the source of the tremor: the shattered peak of the Misty Mountains. Mardûn, with his burned, mask-like face, watched the events unfold. Two great rivals. Two powerful, but uncontrolled, legacies of Morgoth. Both had destroyed each other. Mardûn did not fear. He was not shaken. He saw what had happened as a victory. He himself was the union of regret and rage; these two emotions did not love chaos, they loved order. The Dragon and the Balrog were chaos. Now, this chaos had beean cleansed. The game board was simpler. Mardûn, on his frozen face, made a terrible grinding sound of molten metal and burned flesh, resembling a smile. The war was just beginning. And he had just been rid of two great players.
In Minas Tirith, the noise had given way to an echoing silence. The collective scream of horror that had followed the fall of the Steward Denethor from the tower had given way to a forced obedience, kneaded with fear. The city had not been besieged by an enemy; it had been conquered from within, by a terror wearing the visage of its own Captain. In the obsidian hall at the top of the Tower of Ecthelion, Mardûn pulled his hand away from the Palantír of Anor. The stone orb had gone dark with the image of that final, blinding explosion at the peak of Moria. The Balrog and the Ice Dragon. Two ancient, chaotic forces. Both destroyed. Behind that burned, molten mask, the red ember eyes weighed the event for a moment. What had happened was not a defeat, but a cleansing. Morgoth's loud, uncontrolled toys had been removed from the board. The playing field was now left only to his and his master's will. This new being was the union of Sauron's rage and Boromir's regret; neither emotion loved disorder. Below, the city held its breath. Mardûn left the hall. His walk was no longer the walk of a man; the body, composed of molten metal and burned flesh, moved with an unshakeable purpose, grinding. The White Guards who saw him, those noble soldiers of the Citadel, averted their eyes, staring at the marble floor. The one before them was their Captain. He was their master's killer. He was a nightmare. One guard, with the last shred of courage within him, dared to look at him from the corner of his eye. What he saw was not a burned face; what he felt was worse than the cold of the grave. What he felt was a void. The man's will broke instantly, and he shrank aside, trembling. He emerged into the great courtyard on the seventh level of the Tower, beside the dead White Tree. The sun was pale; as if it did not dare to shine because of the new terror over the city. The commanders loyal to Faramir, or those who still carried a piece of honor within them, were either hiding in the shadows of the city's lower levels or were already dead. Those who remained were the cowards and the opportunists. Mardûn gathered them. He did not give them a fiery speech, as Boromir once had. He did not shout. He did not threaten. He simply, in that sepulchral voice, declared the new truth. "My father was weak," he said, his voice grinding over the stones. "He drowned Gondor in his own fears. He died, fearing the enemy's shadow. I," he said, raising the molten hand on which the Ring shone, "walked through the enemy's fire. And I have brought back power." The commanders looked at that hand, at that dark ring fused into the burned flesh. Fear was a stronger cement than loyalty. "The war is over," Mardûn continued. "I have taken the Ring. Its Master will no longer rule Middle-earth. Gondor will rule. Under me." What he said was the greatest of lies. His orders were clear and cold. "Heralds," he commanded. "To Lamedon. To Anfalas. To Dol Amroth. To all the southern fiefdoms. The lords must come to Minas Tirith to offer their fealty to the new Steward and bring their armies." One of the commanders, Lord Hurin's deputy, stammered, "My lord... Prince Imrahil... he will not swear fealty. He..." Mardûn slowly turned his head to the man. He did not speak. He just looked. Under the gaze of those red ember eyes, the man felt as if he were choking and collapsed to his knees. "He will," Mardûn said calmly. "We will rebuild Osgiliath. But first... we will cleanse the West." His eyes turned west, towards Rohan. "The horse-men of Rohan did not answer my father's call. Their betrayal will be paid in blood." But this was not the only army he gathered. That night, he returned to the tower. He went to the Palantír. He looked not to the West, but to the East. Within the stone, his Master's all-seeing Eye appeared. Mardûn did not report to the Eye; he demanded. "Your armies," he said to the stone. "The power of Mordor. Send them through Cirith Ungol. Not to attack Osgiliath, but to join my army." And then, he looked south. "The Corsairs of Umbar. Let them come by sea. Let them join our fleet at Pelargir." Shadow was being piled upon shadow. Over Minas Tirith, the banner of the White Tree still flew. But in the shadow of that banner, in the streets of the city, soldiers of Gondor were preparing to patrol side-by-side with Uruk battalions from Mordor. What was happening was not a conquest; it was a reversal. Mardûn had not destroyed Gondor's strength; he had stolen it. He had reshaped it with his own dark will. In the dark warrens of the city's lower levels, the handful of Rangers Faramir had left behind whispered, planning resistance. But they were trapped within their own fortress, between two shadows—the shadow of Mordor, and Gondor's own. His departure from Rivendell had been in a silence of rage and humiliation. As Saruman galloped south on his horse towards the Gap of Rohan, he saw in his mind the new, arrogant form of Gandalf. The Grey Flame. It was an insult. He was the Master of Flame; the Maiar of Aulë. And now, that grey fool had returned from the fire and dared to lecture him. That "council" in Elrond's hall had not been an alliance, but blackmail. They had forced him, as penance, to face that Ice Dragon. But Saruman was no fool. As he approached Rohan, he, too, had felt it. The world-shaking shockwave that had come from over Moria. He knew, without needing to look into the Palantír, that those two ancient powers had clashed and destroyed each other. He stopped his horse. The wind howled in the mountain pass. "The Dragon... is gone," he whispered to himself. "And the Balrog... it, too." This truth changed everything. The impossible penance Gandalf had laid on him, that suicide mission, was now gone. He was under no obligation to Elrond or that shattered Fellowship. The oath he had given them was based on a threat that no longer existed. He was free again. When he arrived at the massive, iron gates of Isengard, his anger had given way to cold, sharp calculation. His fortress was in disarray after the loss of Lurtz (his commander who died at Amon Hen). The Ents' earlier attacks (before the council in Rivendell) had damaged parts of the walls. But the Uruk-hai army was still there. They were his creatures. When they saw their master, they roared with a brutish joy. Saruman ascended to the peak of Orthanc, to his silent, dark study. He pulled the cloth off the Palantír. The stone came to life at his touch. But he did not seek the Eye. He skirted the surface, avoiding Sauron's crushing will like a snake. He saw. He saw Minas Tirith. He saw Mardûn, in that burned husk, standing in the throne room of Gondor. He saw that the Eye's attention was focused entirely on that new, powerful puppet. Sauron was playing with his new fortress in the west. "He will fall to his own arrogance," Saruman thought. "He trusts a Man. The weakest of Men." Then he looked north. He saw Gandalf and his two foolish companions setting out for the empty ruins of Moria. "Hunting a dead monster. How poetic." Then he looked south. He saw the futile journey of hope as Aragorn and that other Gondorian (Faramir) made their way towards the Paths of the Dead. Everyone was busy. Sauron was focused on Gondor. Gandalf was hunting a dead Balrog. Aragorn was seeking a ghost army. Elrond was hiding in his valley. And the Ice Dragon was gone. No one, absolutely no one, was looking at Rohan. Saruman smiled. It was a cold, boneless smile. Elrond's alliance was weak. Sauron's will was, for now, focused on a single point. This was a moment of weakness. His enemy's enemy was not his friend; his enemy's distraction was his opportunity. He was not on Gandalf's side, nor was he on Sauron's. He had chosen a third path. His own. "Power," he whispered into the dark room, "does not take sides. Power merely waits for one who will take it." He walked to the door and gave his orders to the Uruk commanders waiting below. "Rohan," he said, his voice regaining its old, persuasive power. "Edoras. Helm's Deep. All the refuges of the horse-men. Our plan has not changed. It has only accelerated. Burn the Westfold. Bring Théoden's hall down on his ashes. Rohan is mine." The White Wizard had once again played the side of power; that side, as always, was only his own. The chimneys of Orthanc began to spew poisonous, black smoke once more that night, forging weapons for thousands of Uruks. When Radagast reached the edge of Fangorn Forest, the world was sick. The air was not just cold; it was dry and brittle. The grass beneath his feet was not green, but a pale, dead yellow. He was a friend of beasts, and the silence here terrified him. There were no birdsong. No buzz of insects. Radagast called to a wren; the bird was huddled on a branch, its eyes dull, and it did not sing. The wizard touched the bark of an oak and felt the tree's sap retreating, its life force weakening, as if being sucked out by an invisible spider. This was not the physical destruction of Saruman's machines. This was the plague radiating from Mardûn's presence. It had killed the grass of Ithilien as he walked to Minas Tirith. And now, that "Shadow" was spreading from the south, across the west bank of the Anduin, poisoning the land itself. "Treebeard!" Radagast shouted into the depths of the ancient forest. "My friend! Wake up! The world is dying!" The answer was not the soft rustle he expected, but a deep THUD, like a mountain shifting. The forest was already awake. When he reached the clearing of Derndingle, the ancient Entmoot, he saw the scene. Dozens of Ents, those giant, tree-shepherds, were gathered in a circle. They were not moving. But they were trembling. This was an Entmoot; a slow, days-long debate. But when Radagast saw Treebeard, he knew this time was different. Treebeard was not drowsy. His eyes, those deep, green eyes, were glowing with anger. "Hoom... hom... Brown Wizard," Treebeard's voice rumbled. His voice was like the cracking of ancient tree roots. "Speak quickly. There is no room for haste in our woods. But... the world is breaking. Baroom." "Saruman!" Radagast said, out of breath. "Isengard! He..." "SARUMAN!" Treebeard's voice turned to thunder. The other Ents began to murmur in anger. "Yes! That wizard with the white hand! Hoom! He is cutting down our friends for his orcs! He is breaking not just branches, but life! His tower must be overthrown! Hooom!" "No!" Radagast shouted, silencing them. "Yes, Saruman is a traitor! But what you are feeling... it is not him!" Radagast placed his hand on the forest floor, on the dead, yellow grass. "This! This plague! It is not coming from Isengard. It is coming from the south! From Minas Tirith! From that White Tower! It is poisoning the soil, Treebeard! Saruman cuts the branches, but this new shadow... this is killing the roots!" Every journey in Middle-earth passed through a door. Some doors opened to hope, others to oblivion. After that desperate council in Rivendell, the ashes of the Fellowship had scattered towards those final doors that would decide their fate. One opened to stone and shadow, one to ice and ash, and the other to fire and betrayal. "The path is here," said Faramir, his voice a whisper beneath the ancient, dark trees. They were under the dark pines of Dunharrow (the Dimholt). Before them, in the mountainside, the dark rift that was the entrance to the Paths of the Dead gaped like a giant's mouth. The air was icy, even in mid-summer. Aragorn sat on his horse. He was no longer the Ranger who had failed at Amon Hen. The star-brooch from Lórien shone on his chest like the sigil of a king. Beside him, the Grey Company, that handful of pale Dúnedain Warriors from the north, along with Elrond's sons, Elladan and Elrohir, waited for him in silence. Faramir's shoulders were slumped. He was following this path not to guide a king, but to take back his home from a monster. The burned, terrible image of his brother, Mardûn, would not leave his sight. "They broke their oath to Isildur," said Faramir, with the supernatural disgust he felt for the place. "They will answer only a king's call. And that king was the one who betrayed them." "Perhaps," Aragorn said in a low voice, "they are not waiting for the one who betrayed, but for the one who was betrayed." He dismounted. "I am not Isildur," he said, his voice echoing in the ominous silence. He placed his hand on the hilt of Andúril, the Flame of the West. "I have come to honor that oath." He took the first step into the dark door. The inside was colder than a tomb; not a physical cold, but the absence of hope. The horses neighed and reared, refusing to enter. The Grey Company left their horses behind and followed their lord, walking into that pitch-black darkness. The light of their torches was instantly swallowed in the subterranean void. It was as if the darkness was a solid substance, drinking the light. And then the voices began. Not whispers heard by the ear, but thousands, tens of thousands of voices, pressing directly into the mind. A susurrus of regret, anger, and betrayal, built up for millennia. "Why have you come?" "He abandoned us." "The oath... The oath is broken." "There is no life here!" "The smell of blood!" "Flesh and bone. The living. Leave us be. GO!" Faramir clutched his head in pain. He was vulnerable to this sound; his father's madness and his brother's betrayal had left cracks in his soul for these whispers to hold onto. "Aragorn!" he cried. "They... They are tearing us apart!" But Aragorn continued to walk. The whispers were attacking him, too, but he knew this pain. This was his inheritance. "The blood of Isildur!" hissed one voice, angrier than the others. "Traitor! You imprisoned us here!" "I did not imprison you," Aragorn roared, his voice exploding like thunder in the underground hall. "You imprisoned yourselves, with your own oath!" He stopped and drew his sword. Andúril, in that absolute darkness, shone with a blinding, pure white light, like a star. In that light, they saw them. In the rocks, in the ceiling, on the floor... Thousands of pale, greenish, translucent faces. Mouths screaming, but making no sound. Averting in pain from the light. "SILENCE!" Aragorn's command was not just a sound, but the forgotten, commanding will of the kings of Númenor. The whispers stopped, for a moment. Aragorn walked into the midst of that ghostly crowd. "I am Elessar, Heir of Elendil and Isildur. I come from the North. The time has come to keep your oath." A laugh echoed; like the rustling of dry leaves. "We have no king," said a voice. "Only betrayal." "We have waited," whispered another. "We have waited for ages. For what? For more lies?" Aragorn raised his sword. "You betrayed Gondor! And Gondor is now ruled by the darkest shadow in its history! The enemy is no longer just in Mordor. The enemy sits in the White Tower, where you swore your oath!" This was something the Dead did not expect. They were waiting for Sauron. At that exact moment, Faramir, turning his pain into will, stepped forward. "I am Faramir, son of Denethor the Steward!" he shouted, his voice broken but angry. "My city has been stolen by a demon wearing my brother's flesh! If you ever loved Gondor, if your oath has any meaning, follow us to overthrow that false king!" This was the key. The call of Isildur's Heir, and the cry of Gondor's last loyal Son. There was a movement in the darkness. A pale, green mist, separating from the ghostly faces, gathered before Aragorn. The mist took the shape of a tall, armored man. His face was carved with an eternal sorrow. The King of the Dead. "The enemy... is within?" the King whispered, his voice the grinding of a thousand tombs. "Within," said Aragorn. "And he calls himself 'King'." The King of the Dead turned his ghostly face to Faramir. "Son of Denethor... We remember your father's pride. But in your voice... there is sorrow. The sorrow of truth." The King turned to Aragorn. "Then... we will fight," he said. "We will overthrow that false king and his shadow. And then... we will find peace." "Our oath will be kept!" the King shouted, his voice now filling the entire hall. "Not with blood, but with loyalty! We will cleanse our betrayal with one last war!" The entire underground hall trembled with a single, massive, silent scream. Thousands of ghosts gathered in that storm of green mist. Aragorn lowered Andúril. "Follow me." He began to run towards the other end of the dark tunnel, and behind him, like a living river of rage, the Army of the Dead flowed.
The other remnants of the Fellowship were before another door. The East-gate of Moria. But this was not the mournful valley they had left. "By the beard of the Valar," Gimli whispered. Dimrill Dale had turned into an ice hell. The Mirrormere was a dead, white mirror, shattered into a thousand pieces. The trees stood like frozen glass statues. The air was so cold that even Legolas's elven-breath fogged. "The Dragon," said Legolas, placing his hand on the trunk of a frozen tree. "Its cold... is still here. But... there is fire, too." Gandalf, in his new "Grey Flame" form, walked ahead. The air rippled around him; his internal fire was fighting against the supernatural frost. Where he walked, the ice melted, vaporizing. "They found each other," said Gandalf, his voice no longer in that old, friendly tone, but like the rasp of a furnace. "This was the cause of the tremor in Rivendell. Ice and Fire." They entered the gate. The great halls of Khazad-dûm were no longer dark and filled with Orcs. They were silent. And frozen. The Dragon's breath, before it clashed with the Balrog's fire, had seeped into these upper halls. On the walls were statues of Orcs, frozen in mid-motion. A layer of frost on their armor, the last, frozen expression of terror in their eyes. "This... this is no longer a tomb," said Gimli, in horror. "This is a monument." Gandalf raised his staff. With the light of the staff, which glowed like an ember, they advanced to the bottom of the Endless Stair, to that bottomless pit. The place where Gandalf had fallen. And there, they saw it. At the very bottom of the chasm, thousands of meters below, that massive thing that had shattered the surface of the (now completely frozen) subterranean lake when it struck. The statue of the Balrog. It was still in that final, angry, roaring pose. Its shadow-body, solidified by the Dragon's absolute zero attack, had turned into a frozen stone of obsidian. The magma fire within it was visible as dark, frozen veins inside the stone. Gimli knelt before the massive, dead monster. Durin's Bane... defeated. But it was not they who had defeated it. "What do we do, Gandalf?" said Gimli, his voice echoing in the vast, frozen hall. "Our enemy... is already dead." Gandalf looked at the frozen statue. "Yes," he said. "One evil has destroyed another. But this is not a victory. This is a clearing of the board. Sauron's work is now easier." He pointed his staff at the frozen Balrog statue. The power of the Grey Flame shot from the staff and struck the frozen stone. The statue cracked. A thin, white line spread across the obsidian body. And then, that millennia-old evil, shattering like glass, turned to dust. "Ash to ash," Gandalf whispered. "Moria is cleansed. But our war is not." He turned. "We must hurry. Aragorn has need of us in the south."