Writer's Note: I had a request on Tumblr for alternate POV of Trahern's first meeting with Maddie and the missing moment when Faramir goes looking for Maddie and she's already left Minas Tirith. So here are those ficlets for your pleasure.

Missing Thoughts/Scenes

(1) Trahern's First Meeting

Trahern hadn't known quite what to expect when Butterbur asked him for a quiet word, let alone that a strange woman speaking no known language had wandered into town.

He probably should have expected someone as unremarkable as her at first glance. This… Miss Maddie looked like a nervous maid and not some worldly traveler.

"This is the woman you spoke to me of?" Trahern confirmed. The innkeeper was no doubt wringing his hands behind his back. Butterbur normally had no problem with Rangers in his establishment, but actually conversing with one was another story.

"Y-Yes, this is her," Butterbur answered.

Trahern took her in, from her shabby shoes and second-hand dress to his plaited hair. She didn't look very different, though perhaps a tad cleaner than most of the women in Bree.

"Don't speak any Westron, do you?" he said to her.

She didn't appear to understand, and that was certainly made obvious by her stumbling reply.

"I— Maddie," she amended, as though unsure. "I don't speak Westron." She smiled proudly at her completed sentence.

The accent and unfamiliarity was undeniable unless she was an excellent actor, so Trahern switched to Rohirric and then Hobbitish just to be sure she wasn't an overgrown halfling. If men could birth people who only grew as tall as hobbits, then it might work in reverse. Trahern had seen stranger things.

She didn't understand either though, and just offhand Trahern tried a bit of the Elvish he knew.

There was no response immediately, but maybe she'd been surprised.

"Are you familiar with Elvish, then?" Trahern asked in Sindarin.

It took her a moment to shake her head. Elvish might surprise some people at first, but Trahern hardly had the voice for it, what with years of smoking pipes. He sat back and filled his pipe, thinking about all the obscure tongues he'd heard and wondering just how far away she might have come from.

So he rattled them off: some tribal dialects of Westron, a hint of the Harad language he'd learned, even bits of Dwarvish and Quenya. But there was no light in her eye to show understanding, and each one made her look more and more despondent.

He paused to wonder just where she must have come from to be so removed from all the tongues of Men, Elves and Dwarves, but she took that as her invitation to try her own hand.

And so many languages she knew it seemed! None of the words she uttered were even remotely familiar, rolling off the tongue in different ways, some spoken boldly others shyly, but she knew them all and tried each to no success. Trahern had never heard any of these tongues, and he'd seen much of the word in his many years as Dúnedain. Where in Middle Earth was she from?

"Um, sir, any luck?" Butterbur asked tentatively.

Trahern paused before answering. "No, but I will keep an ear out."

It took but a moment for the Ranger to firmly commit her appearance to memory. Clearly she wasn't what she seemed, as it looked like even Butterbur had deduced.

(2) Faramir Visits the Kinseys

The visitor at first seemed like any ordinary messenger, at least until the name "Maddie" passed his lips. Then Oriolda stopped pretending to listen with half an ear for gossip and instead devoted both ears to it.

"I have a message for Miss Maddie," the messenger said to the butler expectantly.

"Miss Maddie is no longer here."

"The message is from Lord Faramir," the messenger replied, probably hoping that would ease the way. No one wanted to go hunting down missing girls in their spare time.

Lord Kinsey stepped into the foyer before the butler could reply. "A message from Lord Faramir?" A few months ago this would have been met with excitement. Now, Lord Kinsey looked rather like he was dreading it.

"For a Miss Maddie in your service, sir," explained the messenger. He was starting to sound annoyed.

"Ah," Lord Kinsey said, and Oriolda was fairly sure he was sweating in place. "Miss Maddie is no longer employed here. That is—" he said hurriedly, realizing how that sounded, "she willfully left."

The messenger left the household after that, but neither Oriolda nor Clarimond thought that was the end of it. And if the Kinseys looked a bit stressed every time someone knocked on the door, they knew why.

So it was inevitable that their fears would come to pass. Someone knocked on the door this time, but it wasn't a soldier or a messenger or some young lord looking to play with one of the children, it was Lord Faramir himself.

Lord Kinsey showed him into the parlor, with Everlid doling out tea dutifully and everyone pretending that the servants weren't trying to find the best eavesdropping spot.

"My lord Faramir, what can I do for you?"

"I was hoping to speak with Miss Maddie, but my messenger told me she no longer works here." Faramir didn't ask the question, but his statement was quite leading.

"Ah, yes, Miss Maddie decided to leave of her own accord. We of course asked her to stay, but she was insistent." Lord Kinsey sounded terribly nervous through the door, and Lady Kinsey outside looked distraught.

"I apologize for the intrusion then," Lord Faramir said, and Lord Kinsey began to make the requisite denials before Faramir interrupted him: "That is, I should like to speak to your staff regarding Miss Maddie."

The silence was weighty with shock, but Kinsey could hardly deny the Steward's son, and so the servants were brought into the sitting room to be questioned. When Oriolda's turn came around she didn't bother to hide much at all—it was too exciting being face to face with such a high-ranked lord. And a handsome one too!

"My lord," she said, bowing deeply. "Maddie and I were good friends."

"Did she ever speak of her homeland with you, or perhaps anything out of the ordinary?"

"She spoke of Rohan rarely," Oriolda admitted, feeling disappointed she couldn't help Faramir's search. "And nothing particularly strange."

"Why did she leave? I ask you to be honest; I will protect you from any reprisal." Faramir was looking at her so seriously Oriolda became quite flustered, and it took several moments for her to calm down enough to answer.

"Well… she was angry with us. I think… milord… there were rumors…" Faramir didn't react much beyond waving his hand to continue. "She snapped at us, and told us… well… that she was upset by what some of the servants had said." Oriolda was so deeply engrossed in fidgeting with her skirt she didn't see Faramir's narrowed look. He knew Maddie had mentioned some troubles at work, and but a few rumors had sent her running?

"What rumors?"

"Ah… that she and your Lordship… consorted." Oriolda said the last word in a whisper, as though hoping Faramir somehow might not hear it. Her face was so red she could have been mistaken for a tomato.

"And this angered her terribly?" Faramir asked, remarkably calm about the accusation, though his brow was furrowed.

"Yes milord, very much." The household had talked of nothing but Maddie's sudden departure and fit of anger. Oriolda and Clarimond had trouble grasping what she'd been so upset about, and what little they did disturbed them.

The rest of the servant's interviews went much the same. The whole household was talking about it for weeks after, when Lord Faramir left looking ruffled, even as he tried not to. Lord Kinsey wrung his hands for days after terrified some lightning bolt from the Stewardship would strike him down for daring to remove Faramir's interest from his home. Lady Kinsey, in fact, grew sickly for several weeks following the incident.

Of course, that didn't compare to finding out that a certain Lady of the Secret Fire was also known as the Lady Maddie, and had saved the life of the current Steward and Lord Faramir's brother. Lady Kinsey had fainted dead away at the news, and Lord Kinsey had frantically interrogated every servant about whether they'd known a sorcerer had been hiding in their midst. Needless to say, the whole household was lucky to be alive and intact after angering so powerful a witch.