In the morning, it drifted gently like pollen. The mists receded, and the landscape that once breathed life whispered again.

  Brannalad and Yavendil walked in silence along the overgrown paths. Each step healed the land. Seeds that had slept for hundreds of years were bursting in the earth, reaching out to the light.

  "Your garden..." whispered Brannalad in a deep voice, "...is breathing again. Even though it was wounded."

  Yavendil smiled. "The garden never died, Brannalad. It just waited. The soil has a memory. It knows who planted it. And it knows for whom to wake again."

  She led him to a tree they had once planted together. It was bent now, almost broken, but a new shoot sprouted from its side - young and lush. "This tree is like us," she said. "Old, wounded. But not broken."

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  Brannalad reached out the massive branches and laid them gently on the trunk. The tree grunted as if it recognized its master.

  "Yavendil... you were the light I carried for centuries. Without it, I was not lost - but I did not shine."

  The Ent woman lowered her leaves. "And every day I watered the soil where nothing grew anymore. But now you are here. And I'm not alone."

  Suddenly the forest shuddered. From beneath the leaves, a small creature - a cross between a root and an animal - crawled out. It had little ears of bark and a sparkle in its eyes.

  "This is new life," Yavendil said softly. "It was born from a place where love was not lost - it was just waiting."

  Brannalad bent down, and a small sprout settled on his shoulder.

  "We may be the last," he said softly. "But maybe... no."

  And in the distance, in parts unknown, other gardens felt a faint tremor. Like a root sensing the presence of water.