A love that transcends time

Chapter 3

Gandalf Pov.

The creature was as beautiful as it was big, it towered easily hundreds of feet over me, as I climbed to my feet the creature caught site of me causing me to freeze. It slowly lowered its head with a sound that almost resembled a melody. (Imagine a whale, I can't quite remember what they sound like but with something that big I think whale. No saddle or the piece on the head.)

"By the Valor." I whispered as I looked into the creatures large blue eyes, it blinked slowly and gave a gentle blow almost nocking me over with just its breath before lifting its head back up and walking off. "I thought it was going to squash me." I chuckled to my self before my breath catches in my throat as a large shadow passes over me. I looked up and used my hand to cast a shadow on my eyes so I could see, although not nearly as large, the creature I saw this time did not look as friendly as the last one did. I watched as it alighted onto a ledge a little ways away before letting out a thunderous roar that shook the air around us. Its great wings spread wide. (No saddle)

This creature spotted me almost immediately before alighting again and flying toward an oddly shaped mountain wall. It took me a minute to relize that a castly was built into the mountain wall.

(No snow but the water fall is still there the whole basin is snow free everything is green.)

'I guess that's where I'm headed.' I thought gazing up at the majestic castle, it looked to be dwarven built with an elfish touch to it. As I made my way to the castle I walked through fields of flowers where these little fuzz ball like creatures kept sticking to my clothes. I chuckled as I gently pulled a few off me before placing them back on some flowers where they bounced around happily. I had spotted more of those giant animal as well as a few more of the winged ones, but it wasn't just the animals that where odd, even the plants around me seamed to have evolved and some glowed while others seemed to sway the wrong way in the breeze.

"This place truly is a magical place, I'd bet my pipe weed that the two people from the rumors' are the cause of all this." I mumbled to myself as I trekked toward the mountain palace. It took me a while but I finally made it to the enormous palace doors that where about half as tall as the large long necked creature. As I stood upon the steps debating on whether to knock or not the doors suddenly opened, gently swinging inward, inviting me in. I eyed the doors suspiciously before cautiously walking through them. The first thing I noticed when I walked through the doors was the décor, almost every wall was lined with paintings and shelves filled to the brim with books, I wandered over to the closest bookshelf out of curiosity as to what kind of books where lining this enormous entrance hall. Upon closer inspection of the titles I realized that not a single book on the entire shelf was in any of the languages of any known race that walked middle earth. I quickly made my way to another nearby book shelf to once again see that not one of the books was in any language I had ever seen. Out of intense curiosity I pulled one of the larger books from the shelf and gently opened it to a random page, making sure to be mindful that it was in fact not my book, as I scanned over the page I caught site of a strange symbol that consisted of three lines with each growing in length from to to bottom and the very top one having a small hook to it at the bottom, as I squinted at it trying to figure out what it meant or represented a voice spoke to my right further down the hall startling me and almost causing me to drop the book.

"I hope you know it's not polite to wander into someone's home then proceed to start snooping around." The voice was a confusing mixture between mocking and teasing making it hard to tell if the being was truly irritated or not. I was quick to spin to my right to see the owner of this castle but the sight that greeted me was confusing, it was a small ball of light that seemed to bob gently, I glanced around to try and see if there was perhaps another person in the room that could have spoken. "For such an old being you sure are not very open minded, I would have assumed with how long you have lived and just how many strange things you have probably seen that this would be pretty believable for you." I spun back to where I heard the now very amused tone to see that with each word that was spoken the small ball flashed a gentle light.

"I apologize but I've never seen magic like this, nor have I ever seen this language so curiosity got the better off this old man. I hope you can forgive me it was not my intention to snoop." I stated with a bit of a blush that was thankfully mostly hidden by my hat and beard. I turned back to the shelf and gently placed the book back before turning once again to the magic ball.

"Hmm. Follow me, I'm sure you would rather speak in person about why you came." The ball turned and began to float down the long hall, I chose to remain silent as it led me down several different halls each lined with more artwork and even more book shelves full of books I couldn't read, I could literally feel the ache in my old bones at the need to gain the knowledge hidden in all these books. I debated asking the magic ball but decided that that would have to be a question for another time after the more pressing matters where discussed. After the small ball led me down several more corridors and passed Valor even knows how many more book shelves, it stopped in front of a large pair of doors that automatically opened, I took a deep breath before entering the room, all the sights that I had seen upon exiting the tunnel and listening to the voice from the ball had swelled my respect for these beings. When I entered the room I felt that I couldn't be surprised any more but once again I was wrong, honestly all these sights made me want to lay down and just smoke my pipe as I tried to wrap my head around everything that had been happening today.