Chapter 144

For Future Consideration

The odd thing was that I could not let go of that sense of urgency until we were all of us assembled in that sickroom. I don't know why, but seeing every single one of us there, chatting and laughing, brought it home to me that we had all survived and that it really was over. It was as though finally a weight fell off my shoulders. That following night I slept for ten hours straight – I'd had trouble sleeping too – and woke feeling refreshed and energetic. I had almost forgotten what that felt like.

I wasn't used to having so much energy and just when I had tons of the stuff, I was running out of things to do. The past week had been a whirlwind of activity, directing people and sorting out most of the urgent business. I'd begun to get the hang of the layout of the city and I'd picked out rooms for Helm and Freda to stay in as soon as the roads were safe enough to travel. I wasn't being much of a mother to Harry – there was no way that I could be at this specific time – but I could make good on my promise to these two children. It had the added bonus that it got Mary off my back for a few days.

My parents were staying in Minas Tirith for the time being. Both of them were retired and Mary had put out the word to the neighbours that they were on a holiday in America for a while, so that no one would report them as missing. My mother was quite in her element with all these injured people around. I'd always suspected that she rather missed working and here was the proof of it. It was a trial just getting her out of the Houses of Healing at the end of every day.

My father spent his time quietly lending a hand where it was most needed. He spent time with the patients, calming them or listening to the things they had to say. Other days he'd go around, fixing little odds and ends that no one else found the time for. He never asked to be commended for it. I don't think he even expected anyone to take note of it, but of course it was noted and remarked upon. I think he was quite amazed by just how many people liked and respected him after some time. He wasn't one to make a fuss, but in his own kind and gentle way, he made quite a difference.

Peter on the other hand had not quite come down from the high of finding out that Middle Earth and everything in it was quite real. He was bouncing from one place to the next, eager to be involved. Some people might have found that annoying – some did – but for most of them he was a breath of fresh air, someone who still had the energy to go out and do things when they had almost forgotten how to live instead of just survive. He spent his days embarking on one project after the next, enjoying himself every second of it.

Mary on the other hand spent a lot of time in England. Her husband and children were there. She could not just up and leave whenever she wanted, but she did pop in every other day to see if we were all still all right and behaving ourselves. Usually I fell short of the mark, but that was hardly a new development.

So there I was, finally on top of my game with energy to waste and nothing much to waste it on. Once everything in the palace was up and running again, it did not require me to keep on top of everything. I actually had time to spare. So I decided that it was time to return to something that had been quietly sitting at the back of my mind for the right time to be picked back up again…

Beth

'Right this way,' Beth said. She remembered the way even though she'd only been here one time. It had been a memorable time.

'Where are we going?' Boromir wanted to know.

'I want to show you something.' Yes, she had told him about her vision, but sometimes it was easier to show instead of tell. It was one of her basic rules for writing. She saw no reason that it could not be applied to life in some form or other. 'It'll be good, I promise.'

The vision had given him a sliver of hope when he needed it most. There wasn't any need for hope now, not now that it was all said and done and they were all still alive. She reckoned that he'd still want to see what she had spoken about though.

Of course, this house was by no means a done deal. It looked dilapidated from the outside. There was no telling what years upon years of neglect had done to the interior. Quite frankly she expected all kinds of interesting life forms to have taken up residence for lack of people. But vermin could be got rid of and floors could be scrubbed and walls could be painted as far as Beth was aware.

Then there was the question of ownership to consider. People had lived there before they had decided that Minas Tirith was no longer the place to be. Had they sold the place before they moved? Had they died? Were there heirs? The last thing she wanted was to steal someone else's property.

She saved all those concerns for a later date, once she actually knew if Boromir wanted this as well. Sure, he'd liked the idea of it, but that was when they were on the eve of battle. The little white house was essentially her dream, literally so.

She found the spot again without trouble. By the time they passed through the little gate into the courtyard, enlightenment had dawned. 'The house from your vision.' It was not a question. 'You found it.'

'Not in the state it was in when I saw it like that, but yes.' Beth looked at it and found that view confirmed again. The house was not in a good state. From where she stood she couldn't see much of the roof, but she wouldn't mind placing a bet on it leaking. Badly. There was a lot of work still to be done.

To her relief Boromir did not seem all that opposed to the idea of moving here; a smile tugged at his lips. The palace didn't hold many good memories now. Beth had never liked the place to begin with. It was too sterile, too spacious, too… empty. It was spotlessly clean, not a bit of clutter in sight. If it was, servants hurried to clean it up. It was like an Ikea showroom: perfect, but unlived in.

She knew better than to voice those sentiments right here, but for her it added to the appeal of this little house. Once it got cleaned and repaired a bit, it could have character. That was not something she was likely to find in the palace.

'Which one is it?'

This was off to a rather good start. Beth pointed. 'That one.'

The courtyard had a grand total of nine houses on it. Two on the left, two on the far end, three on the right and two again on the side that they had come in. "Her house" was the right one on the far end. It did not look like much now, but neither did any of the other houses here. They showed no signs of habitation that she could see. Soldiers had taken up temporary residence in abandoned homes, but this place was a little out of the way, enough to avoid detection by warriors needing a place to rest their heads.

'Have you been inside?' Boromir asked.

'Not yet.' Beth grinned. 'I had Mary on my case and either way, I thought you might like to see it with me.' Because that was what this whole marriage business went. She couldn't just make those decisions on her own anymore. This was what she wanted, but not necessarily what he wanted as well.

He did, so off they went. Beth tried to see it with his eyes and did not quite like what she saw. She had her vision to compare it to, but Boromir only saw the rotting shutters and the empty hole where the front door should be. He saw the weeds and vines covering the walls and the discolouration of the brick. In his place she would not have been impressed either.

'After you,' she gestured when they came to the front door.

'Would you not like to go first?'

'I've already seen it.' In a way. 'Seems fair that you get the first go in real life.'

She was oddly nervous about this whole thing. This moment had weight. It mattered. Not so long ago the sight of this place would have made her run a mile, but that was then. That was before she decided what to do with her life and who she wanted to spend it with. Now it held promise and potential. They'd live here and sometime soon Harry would come and join them. Helm and Freda would come. Then, if the vision was right, there'd be two more children. The house would be full.

I could make a life here.

The moment she stepped over the threshold she recognised it. The fireplace was in a right state, but it was exactly where it should be. Over there would be the couch and there the rug and one day, a toddler might play there. Straight ahead was the doorway through which she had seen herself walk with Harry in her wake. It did not at this moment actually contain a door, but that could be remedied.

'This is it?' Boromir looked at her and surely he must have seen the recognition all over her face.

'This is it,' Beth confirmed.

It felt surreal to stand here. It had felt surreal every single time that she had seen something out of a vision come to life in the real world. It was no different now. Part of her was afraid that the whole thing would vanish into thin air if she reached out to touch, but the stone beneath her fingers was solid and cold and real. She blinked and even then it did not disappear.

'What do you think?' she asked.

She appreciated that he took the time to look around and think of an answer. If he'd answered too quickly just to please her, she might have distrusted that, but Boromir was not like that. He looked with another view too. Beth had always asked Terrence or her father when something needed fixing in the house. She could change a light bulb – and a fat lot of use that was going to be to her here – but that was just about the extent of it. She had a feeling that Boromir had learned how to deal with the more practical side of life through sheer necessity.

I've got a lot of catching up to do.

'It needs work,' was the verdict. She noted with satisfaction that it wasn't a no. 'The shutters ought to be replaced and a door can be found.'

'I'm pretty sure the roof is leaking,' Beth supplied to fervent nods from her husband.

'The north wall must be strengthened.'

'There's an awful lot of cleaning to do.'

'The chimney appears to be blocked.'

'A few pieces of furniture would be nice.'

They stopped talking simultaneously. Somehow the talk had gone from whether they'd even consider moving here or not to working out the practicalities of fixing the place up.

'So that's a yes?' she asked, just for good measure.

'You have seen a vision,' Boromir pointed out. 'Can we argue with that?'

Beth had an answer to that. 'It's not written in stone.' Galadriel had told her so. 'We're in control.' In some small ways she suspected that this had even been the case with the book. She had never not been in control of her own actions. When she disliked where the book was telling her to go, she undertook steps to change it. It was the same with the visions. 'The choice is ours.'

He nodded solemnly. 'Yes.'

Well, that was all that needed to be said really, at least for now. Sometime soon they'd need to discuss what exactly had to be done, who was going to do it and when. The time was not quite right for that. But they could go and have a proper look around the rest of the house.

Beth poked her head through the doorway she'd seen herself move through and decided that she had found the kitchen. It was a nice big one, with windows to let in the light. A doorway to her left revealed a dining room of sorts – or at least she suspected that it was used for that – but the kitchen was big enough to seat all of the prospective inhabitants too for more informal meals. Every house ought to have a proper kitchen table, where a lot of family life happened.

The house was bigger than it had looked from the outside. There was room for a study here as well. The house had a back garden she hadn't seen from the street side either. At the present time it contained a wide variety of weeds and a roofless garden shed, but something could be made of it.

The upstairs contained a few more bedrooms than she had anticipated, which was probably just as well, because Helm and Freda had not featured in her vision – she suspected that if they had, she would never have allowed herself to talk to them – and they needed somewhere to sleep too.

'It's perfect,' Beth declared, peering up at the roof in the attic.

'It is not,' Boromir disagreed, pointing at the sizeable hole in said roof.

'Well, not yet.' But it could be. She peered through a doorway into what she reckoned would be Harry's bedroom, the one overlooking the courtyard. She rather fancied the one with the garden view for herself. There was a smaller room next to it that could be turned into a nursery someday.

On the off chance that the two of us are ever going to be long enough in the vicinity of a bed so that something might actually happen. The war might have been won, but in that department nothing had changed. There was always too much to do and by the time they could lie down, it was only to sleep.

Well, this is probably not a good time for starting a family anyway.

Still, it felt as though a significant step had been made. She did feel calmer, she reflected on the way back. Everything was going in the right direction for a change, which was nice. Gimli was healing. The other four of the Mordor boys – a term coined by Mary and cheerfully adopted by the entire Fellowship – were starting to spend more time in the waking world than they were in dreamland. It might not be so long until we can set off.

That should get Mary off her case for a while.

That reminded her. 'Do you want to come north with me, when I go to fetch Harry?'

He pondered that for a bit. 'There is much to do here.'

Yes, and that was her concern as well. There was tons to do here and Aragorn had made it beyond clear that as far as he was concerned, Boromir was his right-hand man. And right-hand men were always busy. There was a war to recover from. People didn't organise themselves. Buildings did not magically rebuild. Then again, who knew what Gandalf could do if he really applied himself, but shortening her life expectancy by actually asking him that was not on the agenda.

Point was, Boromir was busy. Beth was too, but she could more easily be spared. Even if she couldn't, this was about Harry. She had not seen him since October and by now she wished she could just hold him. People made allowances for parents. Besides, come hell or high water, she would be on Folca's back – as much as she really did not want to be reunited with the moody beast – the moment Thráin set off north.

Question was, would Boromir be with her?

Beth wanted him to be. She suspected, judging from his reply, that he wanted that as well. But wanting things was not always enough. She could not always have it her own way. It seemed a repeating theme in her life these days.

But this was something that she really wanted and therefore really struggled to put into words. This mattered. 'The last thing I want to do is to come between you and your duty,' she began, trying to think of a way to start the next sentence other than with a "but." She had known that he had duties when she married him. Hell, a year ago he had as good as considered himself married to his duty – which would make her the mistress, so she did not dwell on that thought for too long. It wasn't fair to make him choose now. 'I'd like you to come, so maybe we could at least bring it up with Aragorn and see what he says. If it's not possible, then it's off the table and I'll go alone. But then at least we'll have tried.'

That was a bit of a compromise, but it was the best she could think of at such short notice. Wasn't marriage supposed to be all about compromises? It had been so long since she had been in a proper relationship that it was hard to remember the way it was supposed to work, but she was trying.

Come to think of it, Alex had not been about compromise really. She was the one who had to compromise and he was the one who always wanted to have it his own way. Hindsight made so many things so incredibly clear. Not that it was a whole heap of use to her now, but still. I've learned from it, so I can do better now.

Boromir considered her words. Beth read the dilemma on his face, but as much as she wanted to, she could not push this. This was a decision he had to make on his own and she could not judge him whatever choice he made, because she had walked into this with her eyes wide open. At this point it could go either way, but she didn't have high hopes.

Then again, she was never really good at betting on the right horse. 'I shall speak with Aragorn,' Boromir said. He took her hand in his.

It really wasn't so bad, Beth reflected, this whole being married business. She could get used to it.

Duria

'She's late.' The statement was somewhat superfluous to requirements, because of course Thoren could see this for himself. And he didn't have any more of a clue as to why she was not where she was supposed to be than Duria had either. 'What's keeping her?'

The annoyance on Thoren's face told her what he made of her fussing. 'You must mistake me for the Lady Galadriel, Duria.'

She didn't, but this did not seem like the right time for witty retorts. They were more in line with Cathy's character and, as they had both noticed by now, she was not here.

The traitors are gone, she reminded herself when she felt the first onset of panic creeping up along her spine. The war is over. There's no harm that she can come to now. We are safe. It is all over.

The most likely scenario was that Cathy had got side-tracked by Halin. Maybe she got to chatting to someone in the street. She was probably so busy that she had lost track of time. These were the perfectly ordinary reasons for why she was not here when she should have been. In fact, she should have been here half an hour ago.

The whole unfortunate episode with Cilmion and the abyss was not so long ago that she had forgotten all about it. Duria rather suspected that she'd remember it for all of her days. The images danced before her mind's eye, adding to her agitation. Maker help Cathy if she had simply forgotten, because Duria was quite sure she'd kill her little sister if she'd made her fret all for nothing.

She strove for calm and at the very least achieved it in her words: 'Do you know where she was supposed to be?'

'In my study, performing my duties.'

Not a place where even Cathy could find trouble, Duria began to think. Then she recalled that Jack was stabbed there not so very long ago and she rethought that. 'I'll go and fetch her.'

Thoren inclined his head. 'Thank you.' Under the outward calm, she suspected that he too was still very much on edge. Yes, the war was over, but the wounds had not yet healed.

'I shall be back shortly,' she announced.

She left Thoren in the company of Harry and Tauriel. With approval she noted that there were two guards posted at the door. In the good old days, there had been one at the most and quite often none at all. Thoren never saw much need for being guarded day and night, so he had often dismissed them so that he could be alone. He argued that he could lock the door against intruders and, if that failed, he was fully capable of fighting them off.

He wasn't capable now.

That was the reason why Cathy was now occupying his seat in his office, performing his duties. She performed them rather better than Duria had believed her capable of. Not that she would be heard to say anything of the sort anytime soon, but in the privacy of her own mind she could admit that Thoren had known what he was doing when he appointed her to the task.

She tried her hardest not to feel left out.

It was not an easy thing to do.

Thoren's study was only a short distance away and to Duria's relief, Halnor was on duty.

'Evening, Duria!' he greeted with more cheer than the situation warranted.

She was not in the mood. 'Is my sister in?'

'Since dawn this morning,' Halnor reported. Some of the cheer slipped away.

The sun had set some hours ago.

'Have you looked in on her?' Duria questioned.

He rolled his one remaining eye at her. 'Two hours past. Alive and well, if a little preoccupied.' The uneasy look on his face belied the chipper tone of voice. Her keen senses told her that there was something he was not telling her.

'What?' she demanded.

The worry vanished to be replaced by annoyance. 'Hold your horses there, will you? She's not in any mortal danger.' Well, that was something. 'The lads and I are just wondering whether she's perhaps… taken on too much.' He phrased that quite carefully.

Duria narrowed her eyes at him in spite of that. 'She is no idle mannish woman who needs to lie down after five hours of work.' Work was what Mahal had created his children for. The mere hint of a suggestion that Cathy was not all that a dwarf ought to be set her teeth on edge. That sentiment had stolen Jack's joy from him since the age of twelve. She'd sooner die than see Cathy's life marred in the same way. 'And you should have known better than to suggest such a thing.'

The annoyance increased tenfold. 'For Durin's sake, do you have to shout at me? I know that, if you'll remember.'

As a suitable response, Duria planted her hands on her hips and wordlessly demanded that he clarify himself further before she made him in some unpleasant way.

He did. 'I know we're all made to work, but most of us remember that we have to eat and sleep and spend some time with our kith and kin if we want to remain well and sane.' Noticing that Duria's frown deepened at the last word, he hastened to carry on before she could tear him to shreds for that as well: 'Cathy has lived in this office for well over a week. Three nights ago she slept there. Halin came and fetched her home well past midnight. We are thinking that perhaps there's too much work for one body alone.' He thought of something and added: 'Your father and mother did everything together and that appeared to work, so we reckoned that if Cathy could have some assistance, it would be more manageable. She is with child, you know.'

'I do know,' Duria growled. She did not like what she heard. 'Will you step aside now?'

'Depends.'

'On what?' He had better have a very good explanation.

Halnor remained unperturbed. 'On whether you're going in there to have a good shout at her or not.'

Duria was all set to fly off into a rage and explain to him in detail and at length that she had no such intention and who did he think that he was to question her, but she closed her mouth before the first word could cross her lips, because he did actually have a point. Cathy was late for an appointment and since she had no good excuse to explain her lateness, Duria had intended to remind her that worrying her kin needlessly was not something she would stand for.

The silence was uncomfortable.

'I will not shout at her,' she promised. She might stare reproachfully for a bit, but not for long. Halnor's words did strike a chord with her and not in a good way. It was true that she had seen but little of Cathy in the past seven days or so. When she did see her, it was always in passing and with a hasty remark from Cathy that they would speak soon, because she was in a frightful hurry and give her best to the lads.

An icy feeling slithered down her spine. She had missed something. And not for the first time either.

She pushed that thought away, just like she would have pushed Halnor if he didn't get out of her way soon. Apparently he still had some sense of self-preservation, because he held the door open for her to step through. Duria closed it behind her before he could get any funny notions about sticking his nose where it was not wanted.

Only when she was sure that Halnor was not about to burst in on them to make some unwelcome contributions did she look at the figure behind the desk. So far Cathy had made no remark about her bursting in unannounced. She'd made no attempt at either a long-suffering sigh or annoyed eye roll to convey her displeasure at the unwanted company.

Cathy wasn't moving.

Duria's heart leaped from her chest to her throat. No, no, no, no! The war was supposed to be over. She wasn't supposed to find that loved ones had died just when she was not looking. This was not supposed to happen!

Almost she turned around to raise the alarm, but then common sense and reality reasserted themselves. Cathy was slumped over the desk, arms flung out across the many documents that littered her desk, her head resting on a slightly higher pile of them. She snored softly.

Thank the Maker.

Cathy was very much alive, but she was definitely not well. Halnor had the right of that at least. It dawned on Duria as she stood there that she truly had missed the obvious, like the dark circles under her sister's eyes and the far too pale complexion and the fact that she had seen far too little of her in recent days. All these simple observations led her to one rather obvious conclusion: Cathy was exhausted.

I should have noticed.

She was half tempted to turn around and leave Cathy to her well-deserved rest. Whatever it was that Thoren had summoned them for, surely it could wait. I have been remiss in my duty to her. Not so long ago in the time when Jack was still alive – so naturally it felt like it had been centuries – Cathy had reflected quite wearily that they seemed to have taken on one another's roles.

She had already stepped towards the door when she thought better of it. Cathy could not possibly be comfortable as she was. Slumping like that would do nothing for her back and neck. She'd be so much more comfortable in her own bed. Duria may have failed in her duties in many ways, but this at least she would do right.

It was her intention to lift Cathy and carry her towards her own home. It was not too far away from here and at this hour there weren't many folk about, so not many would see. If luck favoured her, Cathy would never even wake.

Luck was not on her side.

Cathy stirred the moment Duria placed a hand on her back. 'Time's it?' she muttered sleepily. 'Five more minutes?'

'You can have all the time you want once I've delivered you to your own bed,' Duria replied.

This roused Cathy. 'Oh, Maker be good,' she moaned, lifting her head. Two sheets of paper stuck to her cheek. She did not appear to notice. 'What time is it?' Then, another realisation. 'Durin's beard, I'm late, aren't I?'

'Yes.' If she had worked out as much herself, Duria did not believe that it was her task to deceive her kin. She'd leave those practices to the race of men. 'It's why I came to find you.' All notions of scolding Cathy had left her head now. It wasn't right, not when it was Duria who had fallen short.

Cathy groaned. 'I'm sorry. It's…'

'Too much?' Duria supplied. Was that not what Halnor had said?

It jolted her into full wakefulness and, unsurprisingly, anger. 'Will you stop mothering me, Duria? I am full grown, if you have not noticed.' She batted Duria's hands away and then flung away the two papers still clinging to her cheek. Her hair was in a right state as well, but Duria refrained from offering comment at the moment.

'I have noticed,' she replied calmly. 'But I have also noticed that you are attempting to perform more work than you can handle.'

Cathy brushed her hair away from her face and, in doing so, conveyed much more exhaustion than she had done in her sleep. 'Pray tell me who is supposed to be handling it, then, Duria, because the way I see it, there aren't many folk about who can.' She leaned back in the chair. 'Thoren's recovering, Elvaethor's gone south. Ori is untangling the mess that's piled up in the lower courts.' She listed them on her fingers. 'So tell me which suitable dwarf that's left.'

'I am.' As it was, she was more than a little miffed that Cathy had left her out of her considerations altogether.

Cathy scoffed in a manner that usually indicated amusement. 'Right,' she said scornfully. 'Because you are keeping it all together so well these past weeks.'

It took all her self-control to remember her promise to Halnor and not tear Cathy apart. Verbally of course. Her reply was still somewhat on the acid side. 'You of course would be in a good position to judge this, having kept me under close observation for said past weeks.'

She was not fine. She was nowhere near it. She had trouble sleeping. It had been bad since that time when she believed Narvi and Thoren both gone, but it was worse since Jack died. She only had to close her eyes to see all those things she didn't want to see: her brother, struggling to breathe, bleeding out. There'd been so much blood. He'd been in so much pain. Not close to the end, she knew that, but when she plucked him off the battlefield even he had not been able to stop himself. His screams still haunted her.

Cathy crossed her arms over her chest. The gesture lacked any true power, since her bump was now decidedly in the way. Would that this stopped her. 'I recall how you acted when life went against us. "Duria, the steady rock on which we all build our lives." Only when we needed that most, you crumbled. Forgive me for not relying on you when you've barely left your home since Jack passed.'

There was much she could say to that, but she could not remember the words for the life of her. Cathy was not altogether wrong. She found it hard to get herself to perform the simplest of tasks. It worried Narvi. It worried her sons too. Especially Dari had cottoned on quickly. He never said anything, but he'd have this look. In all the wrong ways it reminded her of Harry; eyes too old for a face that young.

Work is its own remedy. Her father had never been considered especially wise by most folk, but this bit of wisdom was his. When life is hard and you see no way out, then work will give your hands something to do. And if that does not clear your head, then at least you'll have done something useful. He hadn't been one for idleness. And when the tedious business of court drove him near to despair, he'd go to the forges to make, to create. He'd work and that would set him straight.

She had always found this to be true for herself as well. She lived by that rule. Only these past weeks she had forgotten, because there was so much else happening. There did not appear to be any time for work. And so her mind kept spinning around in so many circles that she lost count. Like her father before her, she needed the work to keep her straight.

'Work is its own remedy,' she said. Recognition dawned on Cathy's face. 'So let me work. You ought to slow down at any rate. You're seven months pregnant.' When Cathy opened her mouth to utter some more protests Duria had no interest in hearing, she carried on, a little louder: 'I did not continue to push myself when I was having the lads either, Cathy. I worked during the day, I ate decent meals at regular intervals and I slept more than I usually would.' Not that she'd had much choice in the matter, because her body conveniently overruled her. 'You can share the load or I can speak to Thoren and Halin and they'll see you removed from the work altogether.' She really would after what she had seen here today.

'You'd never.' Cathy glared.

'Care to put that to the test?'

Evidently not. Cathy sighed heavily and shook her head. 'Fine.' She glared some more. 'Though Maker knows why you'd voluntarily dive into this.' She only uncrossed her arms to make a wide encompassing gesture that almost hit her in the head. 'We'll work together. You are not bullying me out. If I feel that you're trying to work me out, I'll speak to Thoren and have you dragged out of the study by your hair. You'd better not put that to the test.'

She had no intent of doing so. 'Very well. Come on, I shall escort you home and we can make a start on the morrow.'

Cathy's compliance stretched as far as rising to her feet. 'What about Thoren?'

Truth be told, she had almost forgotten him. 'He can wait.'

'He wouldn't have asked if it wasn't important.' Cathy's defiance at the very least was alive and well. Duria wondered why she had ever expected any different. 'Let's go.'

It wasn't as if she had much of a say in the matter, so she trailed after her sister, back the way she'd come.

Next time: Thoren has something to tell his sisters. Cathy does not approve. Meanwhile Elvaethor and his crew have a close encounter with orcs.

As always, thank you for reading. Your reviews would be very warmly welcomed.

Until next week!