Chapter 9

The Princess and the Ranger road over the once Narnian plans. Aragorn wasn't sure how long they had been riding, but he guessed it been close to an hour.

He eased the horse down to a trot as they approached the end of the woods. He slowed the bay to a walk and finally to a stop. The air was cool in the shade of trees and the wind was absolutely still and the rushing sound of water could be heard quite loudly. In one swift movement, Aragorn dismounted the horse and extended a hand toward the Princess. Without hesitation Leia took his hand and less gracefully dismounted the horse.

"Thank you." She said quietly.

Aragorn nodded back. Holding the reigns he moved to the horses head and scratched it muzzle. The horse had exceptionally big brown eyes and its black forelock feel over its white blaze. Oh, how much this horse reminded him of Roheryn.

"So, where are we?" The Princess asked perching her hands on her hips.

The Ranger gave her a sideways glance. " I'm not sure, Professor Cornelius said we wold come to a river I suppose this is it "He said continuing to stroke the horse's neck.

"I never did catch your name." Leia prompted. If she was going to be traveling with this man she at least needed to know his name.

Aragorn paused, with his hand poised over the horse's muzzle. "Aragorn." He said quietly not looking away from the horse. The bay's lifted his head away from the Ranger's hands.

"I'm Leia." The Princess replied. Aragorn led the horse to a low hanging tree branch and tied the reigns to it. Leia watched him curiously.

"You're good with animals." Leia observed. When the Ranger didn't reply she continued to speak. " You don't say much, do you." It was a statement more than a question.

" I've learned the importance of a silent tongue."

Leia nodded, that was understandable. She could give countless accounts when she had learned that herself.

"We'll rest for a while then we should continue on. We don't know if they're tracking us or not. And its best too keep moving." He moved to the horses flank and began checking over the saddle. Again Leia watched him with curiosity, as he spoke gently and quietly to the animal. It was a horse, if she remembered correctly. She edged closer to the animal so to hear what Aragorn was saying.

"Stille nu. Hwaet nemnao oe? Hm? Hwaet nemnao oe? Manen le? Hodo mellon." The ranger knelt down be the horses front hooves. The bay danced in place shying away from the touch. " Faeste, stille nu, mellon." Leia watched in amazement as the horse almost immediately calmed down and w the man to check each of its hooves.

"I think its name is Charger." Leia piped up. Aragorn glanced up at her. " I saw it on the door where you got him from." Charger shook his head as if to confirm the Princess' words.

"Charger it is then." Aragorn said standing to his feet. "Are we ready to continue?" Leia nodded and came to stand by the Ranger. " We'll walk him to the edge of the woods and ride him from there." Aragorn explained.

"Alright." Leia replied, she wasn't really sure what to say to the man. He really wasn't the best conversationalist.

The woods fell away to a pebbly beach with a wide river and had mirrored scenery on the other side. The water was clear and swiftly moving. The sound of the rushing liquid was quite deafening but it was certainly loud enough to drown out any animal or man that came close to the river's edge. Aragorn moved to the water's edge, leading Charger behind him.

"The water's too deep for both of us to ride through, and Charger is already struggling with both of us on land." Aragorn reasoned He strode to the horses flank and check over the tack one more time.

"So, what are we going to do?" Leia asked.

Without another word, the Ranger held out a hand to the Princess. Unsure of what he was getting at, she placed her hand in his, and before she knew it, she was on Charger's back once again.

"What are doing?" she questioned.

"Crossing the river." He replied shortly. He un-slung his quiver and bow from his back and strapped them to Charger's saddle horn. He un-strapped his sword and tied it the saddlebags. Once again he picked up Charger's lead reigns and began to lead him into the water.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Leia clutched the horsed mane, " What are you doing?" her voice had gone from questioning to fearful.

Aragorn stopped to look at her, " I said, we're crossing the river." He said simply.

Leia huffed, he certainly wasn't one for comforting or explaining.

Aragorn led the horse into the cool water. At first Charger shied away from the water. " Whoa, whoa, Charger. Stille nu, iesten Man le trasta, Charger, hm? Man cenich?" The Ranger's elvish words had a soothing affect on the horse. Again the Heir of Isildur easied the horse into the water and began leading him across the river. A third of the way through the water rose up to the horse's haunches and almost up to Aragorn's chest. Half way through the water had risen to Charger's head, and Aragorn had to swim because it was so deep. The bay's neck was stretched so it barely kept his head over the water's glassy surface. Leia clung to the horses matter mane, she was soaked up to her waste and utterly terrified. They where only in the middle of the river for a minute but it felt like an hour. Slowly, the water began to subside as they came closer and closer to the other side.

With one final effort Charger hauled himself onto the pebbly shore. Leia slid off the horses wet back with relative ease. Aragorn dropped the lead reigns and shook his, clearing excess water from his hair. Charger shook himself much like a dog does after a bath, and showered water droplets every where.

Aragorn moved to the horses flank and checked his weapons for water damage. The scabbard on his sword kept most of the water clear of the blade, but he wasn't satisfied until he thoroughly dried it with what un-dampened cloth he could find. Satisfied his sword was well taken care of, we moved to his quiver of arrows. The check over proved to be unnecessary when the arrows shoed themselves to be dry.

"We should keep moving, until nightfall. We should put as many miles between us and the Talmeriens as possible before nightfall. The water will through them off our sent for a short amount of time, but we might not have long."

"Agreed, we should probably do something to cover our tracks from when we crossed the river." The Princess added.

Aragorn glanced at her with mild surprise.

"Don't I get a say in anything?"

Leia jumped at the unfamiliar voice. Aragorn's hand was instantly on the hilt of his sword.

"Show yourself!" the Ranger demanded of the unknown.

"I did show myself, your just not looking." The voice said again.

This time Aragorn unsheathed his sword and held it readily in front of him. He gestured for Leia to get behind him, hurriedly she did as told and moved in between the Ranger and the horse.

"Now, there's no need to draw your sword." The voice soothed. It sighed heavily. " Fine, fine, I thought you humans were smarter then that."

The voice said no more, and there was momentary silence. It was followed by the sound of horse hooves o hard packed earth. But the sound didn't belong to any approaching rider, but their own horse, Charger. The bay had moved to stand in front of the Ranger. He craned his long slender neck to look at Aragorn directly. Charger shook his mane and nodded his large head. "See, I'm right here. You humans aren't' as bright as you seem." The horse said shaking his thick mane again.

Leia had gone wide-eyed during the exchange. She had never seen a creature like this before, but by the stunned expression on Aragorn's face, she could tell that this wasn't normal behavior.

The horse glanced from Aragorn to Leia and back, "What? Haven't you ever seen a taking horse before?" Both humans were still to stunned to speak. "Oh, and my name is Windsor. That's what my mother named me. Not Charger."

It took another minute before Aragorn found his voice again.

"You can speak?" he asked a little tentatively.

Windsor only blinked at him, " I'm doing it right now, aren't I?"

"Yes," the Ranger said slowly.

"Wait, you mean this isn't normal behavior?" Leia asked a little more than alarmed.

"No, they don't usually talk." He explained.

"Unless you're in Narnia," Windsor jumped in. " Which you are, animals talk here."

"Do all animals talk here?" Aragorn asked.

Windsor tossed his head and pawed the ground. "Only Narnian animals talk, but not all them at that."

"Well, Windsor, you said you wanted a say in what we did next," Aragorn couldn't believe he was talking to a horse.

"We'll do exactly as you said," the horse swished his tail, "I really had no problems with it in the first place."

"So why did you object in the first place?" Leia asked.

Windsor made a gesture that would have been a shrug. " I wanted see what you'd when you found I could talk, and you guys seemed to be trustworthy enough."

Aragorn decided to take that as a compliment. "Professor Cornelious said we had to get to Aslan's How. Do you know how to get there?"

Windsor appeared to be thinking about the proposed question, "Hm, not sure, maybe if you keep going west you might run into it."

Aragorn stroked his chin thoughtfully. So much good that did us. He thought. " Well, we'll keep going west then." He said out loud.

Windsor snorted, and trotted over the Princess, "Ladies first." He said as he lowered himself to the ground so she could get on.

Less then graceful, Leia climbed onto the horses back, and clung for dear life when he stood again. Then he steadily walked over to Aragorn. In one swift movement he easily mounted Windsor and took the reigns in his hands.

"I suppose you don't need my to use these?" he said holding up the leather straps.

"Yes, thank you. I am perfectly capable of steering myself. I would much rather if you took them off completely." He replied.

The Ranger sighed as he slid off the horse. Within a few moments the bit and bridal had been removed from Windsor's head and strapped to the back of the saddle.

"Ah, that's much better." Windsor said working his mouth, "thank you."

Aragorn patted the horse's neck. Once he was back in the saddle he loosely took a fist full of main in his hand.

"Alright, ready?" Windsor asked. He craned his head around to look at his passengers.

With a cautious nod from Leia and a subtler one from Aragorn, Windsor trotted off away from the river.

It wasn't till after dark when they stopped to make camp. They found a clear sport partially shaded by trees and partially open to the night sky. Aragorn started to build a fire, which Windsor ws very opinionated about.

Once Strider was able to get Windsor off his back, the horse plodded over to Leia to talk her through setting up camp. After everything was set up, they settled down for the night. Aragorn took the first watch and traded off with Windsor every four hours, allowing the Princess to rest all through the night.

The night passed uneventfully, and when morning came Windsor was on watch so he was the first one up. The bay awkwardly stood from his resting position and walked over to Aragorn's sleeping form and nudged his face with his muzzle.

"Wakey, wakey, Ranger! Rise and shine, time to get up. Let's get moving!" Windsor said cheerily.

"Alright, alright, I'm up." He said sitting up and stretching his arms, shoulders. "I'll wake the Princess." He said standing.

"Good, I'll just munch on some grass until you're ready." The bay moved off to the side of the fire and began nibbling on fresh green grass.

Aragorn sighed at the sassy horse. He walked from his resting-place and rolled up his blanket and knelt down next to the Princess and gently shook her awake. "My Lady, it is time for us to keep moving."

It took Leia a few minutes to become fully awake, but she was up and preparing to leave.

Once everyone had eaten and the fire was thoroughly put out, Aragorn and Leia mounted Windsor and on there journey once again.

Author's Note:

Hello all! I'm sorry, I'm so so sorry about the lack of updates. I really caught up in sports. I wanted this chapter to be up before I went out of town two weeks ago, but that didn't happen. So here it is and I hope it's better then the last chapter, which I want to sincerely apologize about. It was not my best, and should have done a better job on it. Also feel free to suggest any questions for the Question of the Day. Thank you for reading and reviewing!

BlackShaftedArrow: Thank you! Describing Gandalf is always fun Swords are cool but I would have to pick a sonic screwdriver. Thank you for reading and reviewing! I'm glad you like it.

Pip the Dark Lord of All: That's a good choice, that one would probably be my second choice. It is! You should really watch Doctor Who, it's amazing! Thank you for reading and reviewing!

LadyOfAnfalas: Thank you for reviewing and being honest in your reviews. (Not saying anyone else is not honest!) But you always are strait forward and don't' sugarcoat what need to be improved.(Again, not saying anyone else does this.) I deeply apologize for the last chapter, and hopefully this one is better.

Elessar's Daughter : Thank you! I'm so happy you like it! That's got to be one of my favorite ones to write, cause Narnia and Middle-Earth are very alike then you have Leia who has no idea what's going on. Thank you for reading and reviewing!

Karen: Thank you for your encouragement! I will definitely keep going with this story. I'm glad you like it. Yeah, the first meeting is always fun to write, then trying to figure out they would interact is the hard part. Spoilers! Just keep thoughs things for future reference!

Song of the Day: Safe and Sound by: Taylor Swift

Question of the Day: In a sword fight between Aragorn and King Miraz, who would win?

Bible verse of the Day: Psalms 1:1-3

1"Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.

2 But his delight is in the law of the Lord; and in his law doth he meditate day and night.

3 And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.

Again, thank you for all your guy's support and reading and reviewing! It means a lot to me. If I missed anyone in the review replies I deeply apologize and know that I did not do it on purpose and will get back to you! And one more thing, I will be gone this week due to camp, so I will see you all in a week from today!

EvenstarWarrior