The White Council

I had expected meeting Saruman to be nerve-wracking. Now, as I gazed at the white wizard's extremely shocked expression, I wondered why I had been so nervous while I struggled to suppress a burst of laughter at his face.

Now that I thought about it, though, why was he so surprised, anyway? Didn't Elrond say that they had informed Saruman about what truly happened on the day I essentially committed Sauron-cide?

Perhaps he didn't expect me to return. Well, too bad for him.

"Mairon," the elderly-looking man almost spat out, obviously showing no interest in being respectful. I could have understood his attitude if I were still Sauron, but he already knew that wasn't the case, so what the hell? Besides, wasn't this the guy who turned to the dark side – which he hadn't done yet and maybe wouldn't do now that Sauron was dead, but the point still stood – to follow that madman anyway? "Why are you here?" he asked rudely.

I pointedly took the seat farthest away from him, causing Elrond to sigh, likely developing yet another headache from my antics. The meeting with Thorin before hadn't exactly helped the elf lord's peace of mind either.

"Hello to you too, Curunir. What a wonderful day we are having, is it not?" I asked cheerfully, ignoring Saruman's double take and the pointed look Gandalf threw my way as he took a seat next to me, unfortunately giving him a front-row view of Saruman's arrogant face. Poor guy.

"It is Saruman now," the man growled, clutching his staff tightly. Seriously, couldn't they just leave those things on the floor or against the wall when they had to sit somewhere? Did they really need to hold them all the time?

"Is it?" I retorted cheekily, and I had the urge to giggle like a kid when Saruman's face turned a furious shade of red.

He was about to say something else, likely an insult directed at me, when he suddenly fell silent and deflated. His gaze shifted past my shoulder to someone, who, by all appearances, had just entered the room. Already suspecting who that person was, though, – I mean, who else could it be, really? – made me believe that they had probably been there from the very beginning.

A strange tingle in my head prompted me to turn around and smile at the last people to join us.

Glorfindel stood there in all his golden-haired glory, accompanied by a beautiful elleth who couldn't be anyone else but Galadriel. And she was staring right at me.

'Well, hello there,' I thought in the forefront of my mind, giving her the impression of wiggling my fingers in a cheeky greeting.

Galadriel's eyes widened in surprise for a brief moment, but she quickly returned to her usual calm expression. I didn't know whether she was more shocked at my presence there or the fact that I had felt her read my mind – wait, did she even read it or was there some sort of mental bullshit involved? Don't tell me I also had a mental wall or something like that! What even-?!

Elrond stepped forward then, no doubt wanting to make the introductions – never let it be said that he wasn't a great host – and I wondered if Galadriel had ever known who Sauron really was when he arrived in Eregion under the guise of Annatar. She must have, though. Maybe not during those years, but later on.

Oh boy. I really hoped that wouldn't ruin her impression of me.

"May I introduce Lady Galadriel, the Lady of Lorien," Elrond said, addressing me first. "And my Lady, this is Mairon."

Galadriel's gaze was steady as Elrond made the introductions, and her piercing eyes seemed to probe deeper into my very soul. She inclined her head gracefully in greeting. "Many are the tales I have heard of your story, yet I find myself in doubt as to whether they hold truth in them. Dark were the days of old," she said, and while Saruman scoffed in derision, I felt pleasantly surprised when I noticed that Galadriel wasn't looking at me as if I were an enemy.

Sure, she was still wary of my presence here, but there was an underlying curiosity more than true suspicion shining through her eyes, and I counted that as a win.

I stood up and bowed my head at Galadriel, to the surprise of most in the room – Gandalf just looked amused this time, probably at the expense of the others. "Much have I heard of your wisdom and grace, Lady Galadriel. A star truly shines on the hour of our meeting."

Galadriel smiled then, as if I had passed some sort of test, and shifted her gaze to Gandalf, who quickly stood from his seat as well and tried to straighten his grey robes. "Lady Galadriel," the old man said, looking quite flustered, and I watched in amusement as Gandalf stuttered out a clumsy greeting.

"Mithrandir. It has been a long time."

"Age may have changed me, but not so the Lady of Lorien," Gandalf said, bowing his head. I moved my gaze away before I could roll my eyes at him, which made me meet Saruman's eyes. We both stared at each other and quickly looked away before we could acknowledge that we had probably been thinking similar things in regard to Gandalf's schoolgirl crush – slash – admiration – slash – friendship.

It would be a cold, cold day in hell when Saruman and I publicly agreed on something.

After we all took a seat again – Saruman hadn't moved an inch from his since he first arrived – except for Galadriel and Elrond, who for some ungodly reason opted to stay standing, we began the meeting.

Until now, everything had followed the original story, except for some minor details, and it was freaking me out.

The butterfly effect I created by destroying the ring should have changed the whole future in its entirety. Hell, maybe Bilbo and some of the other dwarves should have never been born because I destroyed the ring so early! Yet, no one was missing.

The elven rings were supposed to have lost their power. Yet they didn't. I could still feel the three rings, especially now that they were all in the same room with me – and there was another thing to consider. Why the hell did Gandalf have Narya?! Círdan gave it to him so that it would help him fight against Sauron, didn't he? But that happened after the War of the Last Alliance, so with Sauron being defeated earlier than in canon, Círdan wouldn't have had any reason to give Gandalf Narya, yet he gave it to him anyway.

Heck, Aragorn wasn't even supposed to be in Rivendell!! If I remembered correctly, in the books, the last king of Gondor was killed by the Witch-king of Angmar – who this time didn't get that title in the first place because he was gone – after the Witch-king invaded Arnor and made Aragorn's ancestors flee and start living in hiding, which is why his family had been with the Dúnedain for years after that.

The question was; if the Witch-king never came to be because, by destroying the ring early, all the Nazgul passed on, then how did Arnor fall and why was Aragorn hiding in Rivendell?

Or better yet, how did Gandalf get the key and the map from Thorin's father, who was supposed to be captured in Dol Guldur?! And by whom?! Because he sure as hell wasn't captured by Sauron this time!

It just didn't make any sense. The only change I had seen until now was the fact that the family who was supposed to be killed by the trolls never died because the trolls never came down from the mountains – and that wasn't an important change per se. 

Well, and Gollum didn't exist. I was 100% sure of that. Without the ring, Smeagol could never become Gollum. So that was another change – one which was admittedly more important than the last, at least as to how it affected the events after the Hobbit.

But those were only two changes.

With the butterfly effect, there should have at least been a hundred different things to consider.

But they never happened. And now there was someone in Dol Guldur who Radagast claimed to be a Necromancer?!

What the hell was going on?!

I tuned back to the conversation when I heard Gandalf mentioning Smaug. "– but if he should side with the enemy, a dragon could be used to terrible effect."

"What enemy?" Saruman asked, looking incredulous, "Gandalf, the enemy is defeated. Sauron is vanquished. He made sure of that," he said, pointing in my direction without looking at me. "He can never regain his full strength."

And then, just as I was expecting Elrond to interject, said elf exchanged grim looks with Glorfindel and Galadriel which instantly set me on high alert.

"Did you perhaps forget what happened about a thousand years ago?" Glorfindel spoke up for the first time, addressing Saruman, who looked annoyed for being interrupted but looked at the golden-haired elf anyway.

"Of course not," Saruman grumbled, "but that has nothing to do with this. There is no enemy of the kind Gandalf is speaking of. That would be absurd. Only Sauron's allies remain, and even those are dwindling over time. It will not be long before we have found them all and eliminated them."

"Wait just a moment," I interjected, "whatever happened a thousand years ago?" I asked Glorfindel, who winced in reminiscence.

"You do not know?" Elrond asked, surprised, and I frowned.

"Know what? I have not exactly been around since the war, remember?"

"And where have you been?" Saruman asked suspiciously while sizing me up, no doubt thinking I had something to do with whatever they were discussing.

"Inside a wardrobe," I told Saruman with such a straight face that it left him gaping at me in bewilderment and Glorfindel stifling a snort against his fist.

"Many things have happened since you were gone, Mairon," Elrond said gravely, walking slowly around the room, which was annoying because it made me turn my head to follow him with my gaze. "When Sauron was vanquished, the High Kingship of the Dúnedian passed to Isildur. Many Elves sailed into the west after the line of Gil-galad ended, most of the Noldor and many Sindar as well. The orc armies of Sauron that remained scattered and found places to hide in, so deep and dark that we have not been able to find them all. Isildur was unfortunately killed not long after the war."

I was surprised to hear that. Seeing as Isildur hadn't taken the ring this time, I had wondered if he was able to avoid his fate. But it looked like that wasn't the case. Was that a fixed point in time? Were those even real?

"After that, there were many battles among the race of Men," Elrond continued, "more than we have time for. And that is when it started. The Dark realm of Angmar was formed north of Rhudaur. Orcs began to reappear and infest the Misty Mountains."

'The Dark realm of Angmar,' I mouthed to myself with a rising feeling of incredulity. The Dark realm of Angmar?! What type of bad joke was this?!

"A decades-long civil war known as the Kin-strife started in Gondor after Eldacar, son of Valacar, son of Minalcar, became king. After the founding of the Shire and many successions in Gondor later," I had a feeling Saruman was getting tired of the history lesson, judging by his expression, "Gondor destroyed the Dark realm of Angmar in the Battle of Fornost, where Arvedui, Gondor's king back then, lost his life. Aranarth, his son, assumed the title Chieftain of the Dúnedain, and the Dúnedain went into hiding. About twenty years after that, Minas Ithil was attacked and was renamed Minas Morgul. Minas Anor, on the other hand, became Minas Tirith."

"He does not need to know all that," Saruman grumbled, "We will all be here until dawn if we continue with all the history of Middle-Earth."

Elrond looked heavenward as if asking for patience.

I drummed my fingers against the table. "So you believe the Necromancer Radagast mentioned before has something to do with this Dark realm of Angmar?" I asked Gandalf, who nodded wearily.

"I fear that may be the case," the gray wizard sighed, not even bothering to chastise me about listening in on his supposedly private conversation with Radagast, "for you see, Angmar was named as such because of the rumors of a dark sorcerer who became its ruler. We do not know who this sorcerer is, or even if they exist in the first place, but I cannot help but think that all these facts are somehow connected. If this Dark Sorcerer has anything to do with Sauron…then I fear what might befall Middle-Earth."

"Those are only conjectures," Saruman waved it off, "this…Necromancer, is nothing more than a mortal man. A conjurer dabbling in black magic."

"And so I thought too," Gandalf admitted. "But Radagast has seen –"

"Do not speak to me about Radagast the Brown," Saruman interrupted him. "He is a foolish fellow."

Gandalf looked mildly offended, although he didn't protest Saruman's description of Radagast hardly enough. "Well, he is odd, I grant you. He lives a solitary life."

Saruman seemed as if he wanted to roll his eyes. "It is not that. It is his excessive consumption of mushrooms."

Here I had to admit I almost snorted out loud. It was funny. Just a little.

"They have addled his brain and yellowed his teeth. I warned him, it is unbefitting of the Istari to be wandering in the woods…,"

I tuned Saruman's prattle out while I thought about the facts I just learned.

The history of Middle-Earth Elrond had just explained had stayed almost the same as in canon – at least what I remembered of it – except for the fact that the Witch-king had been replaced by a mysterious figure known as the Dark Sorcerer – which was a terribly unoriginal name, but to each his own – who was now presumably in hiding. Whether that was Mordor or Dol Guldur was yet to be seen.

Concerning Sauron's allies, there still appeared to be many orcs in Middle-Earth, and I guessed goblins and the like would still be running around, seeing as most of them lived underground in their caves and so they were mildly protected from intruders – in this case, the elves. And there were still the Haradrim, the Easterlings and the Variags to consider.

I still found it shocking that not a lot of things had changed due to my actions with the One Ring. Was it the presence of this Dark Sorcerer? But even so, more things should have been altered if that was the case, shouldn't they? The mere existence of one new player couldn't make the game stay like in the beginning. It should have changed everything. Yet it didn't.

Were my actions somehow countered by this new variable?

Was this a 'mess with thy future and thy future shall mess with you' kind of situation? Because if it was, it majorly sucked.

Here I was, thinking that I had avoided all the veritable clusterfuck that came after the War of the Last Alliance, only to learn that I had presumably exchanged one evil for another.

Fucking hell.

I knew it was too good to be true.

Glorfindel's slight nudge to my side made me refocus in the conversation. Fortunately, for me and for everyone – no doubt about that – Saruman had stopped with his monologue. Finally. I thought it would never end. What wasn't as fortunate, though, is that the white wizard found it a good moment to ask me why exactly I joined Thorin's Company, and what I thought would happen once – and if – we reached Erebor.

I tilted my head in consideration. "Well, I expect Thorin will get hyper-fixated on his family's gold, and we are going to have to intervene to pull that stick out of his ass before he does anything stupid, like throwing Bilbo down a 20-foot-tall wall and killing the poor hobbit, which would make me very mad, and I would probably kill Thorin after that –" or at least that's what I wanted to say. I sincerely hoped that didn't happen. Because I would kill Thorin if it did, gold sickness or not.

"Well," I said – this time for real – "Bilbo wished to join the Company, and it is not like I had anything better to do, so why not? I suppose we will have to wait and see how it goes, but I have a good feeling about it," I said, shrugging my shoulders, and Glorfindel rolled his eyes at me.

I threw him a look and pouted. Rude.

"So you went to this suicidal mission because the halfling decided to go?" Saruman asked incredulously.

"His name is Bilbo, thank you very much. Bilbo," I told him. I didn't care that Galadriel or even Elrond sometimes referred to Bilbo as the halfling. I knew they didn't mean it in a bad way. But Saruman was another story. The arrogant prick just thought he was better than everyone else just because he was a Maia and that gave him the right to insult other people and expect them to just take it. "And yes. What other reason would I need? And why are you so worried about this anyway? It is not like you are going with us. Wait, are you?" I asked, completely horrified.

Elrond smiled slightly behind his hand.

"Of course I am not going," Saruman rebutted, almost looking offended at the thought of traveling with us mere mortals.

"Oh, thank God," I sighed in relief, and I saw Glorfindel trying – and failing miserably – to contain his snickers. His cheeks bulged in such a way with the effort that for a moment he looked just like a chipmunk.

After Saruman threw me a nasty look while trying to be covert about it, Galadriel spoke for the first time in all the meeting.

"Tell me," she addressed me, "Bilbo Baggins. I wonder, what is it about him that inspires such loyalty from you?"

Her keen eyes observed me as I searched for an answer, as if she was somewhat wary and yet curious about what I would tell her at the same time.

I smiled so brightly that I was surprised I didn't blind anyone right there and then – which, knowing my possible powers that I had yet to discover, would not be that far from the realm of possibility.

"I love the beautiful, innocent way in which he sees the world. His admirable courage. His wit and his amazing stories. His hidden sarcasm. His great sense of adventure. His indomitable curiosity. But more than anything, I admire the absolute kindness he holds in his heart, one which let him invite a complete stranger to live with him just because he saw a person in need of help."

I smiled, this time in a softer manner, and I looked on as the first rays of sunshine emerged from the horizon. "So you see, why would I not be loyal to the one I am proud to call my dearest friend?"

While Gandalf and Elrond looked understanding, Galadriel continued to gaze at me, her expression changing into something softer. Kinder. It was as if she had seen a glimpse of something in me that she hadn't expected.

Saruman, on the other hand, seemed completely uninterested in my answer. He leaned back in his chair, a smug smirk on his face, as if he had already made up his mind about me.

Glorfindel, ever the supportive one, couldn't resist adding his own commentary. "Well said, my friend! I can certainly see why you and Bilbo get along so well. You both have a way with words!"

I smiled and slowly stood up, bowing my head slightly to Galadriel and Elrond, who both returned it with various degrees of curiosity.

"Well, see you, Goldilocks," I told Glorfindel with a cheeky smile and a wave while I quickly headed for the stairs. "Are you coming, Gandalf?"

"In a moment," the old man said, looking meaningfully at Galadriel, and I stared at him in fond exasperation.

"Sure. Do make haste, though. I do not know if an old man like you will be able to catch up with me."

"Very funny."

"Extremely," I returned, and I looked at Glorfindel, who asked me in confusion, "wherever are you going in such a rush?"

I titled my head. "Oh, I am just waiting for something that should happen…yes, right about now."

I stepped away just in time to dodge Lindir's hurried figure that had just appeared atop the stairs.

"My Lord Elrond; the dwarves, they have gone!"

Saruman stared accusingly at Gandalf. "You knew this would happen," he told him.

Gandalf appeared confused. "Whatever do you mean?"

"Oh, do not mistake me for some dimwitted fool, Gandalf! You know what I mean! I do not know why it did not occur to you that this was a foolish mission from the start! Now, if you had come to me I would have -"

I took this as my cue to quietly exit the room, wondering how long it would take Gandalf to escape Saruman's prattle.

But as much as I would like to stay and see Saruman chewing Gandalf off, I needed to catch up with Bilbo and the others, and I needed that yesterday.