The mountains were not a place of exile but of passage. Every elf who longed to claim their place among the hidden kin had to walk the path alone. It had always been so.
As early spring thawed the valley, the young elve set forth. The ascent was silent, save for the wind threading through the cliffs and the crunch of snow where the sun had yet to reach. The cold bit at her skin, but it was nothing compared to the weight of solitude. The trial was not one of endurance alone; it was a test of spirit. The mountains did not welcome strangers. Their slopes had swallowed many who sought answers but lacked the will to carve their own.
Days blurred into nights. The last shadows of winter faded, replaced by rushing streams and green piercing through rock. Hunger was digging into her sides, exhaustion drowning her thoughts, but she was still moving forward.
When summer finally claimed the peaks, she had long ceased counting time. The silence no longer weighed upon her, it had become a part of her. She had learned to listen, to move as the land moved, to shed everything she once was and stand bare before the world.
And then, she was no longer alone. A figure stood upon a ridge ahead, watching. Not a stranger, but a sentinel. The woman bore the vestures of the mountain tribe, her garments adorned with the symbols of those who had walked this path before. She had been waiting; not for that particular elve, but for those who proved themselves worthy.
She herself had once walked the same trial, had once climbed with the same uncertainty in her steps. Now, she was a scout, one of those who watched the mountains with a piercing but gentle gaze. The elve had not been seeking a destination. She had been proving she was ready to belong. Silence, once her burden, had become her ally. And the mountains had responded.
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