Wherein some, though not nearly all, questions are answered.

"The Dread Pirate Roberts." Estel makes a dismissive noise, his eyes closed and face turned to the morning sun.

The two of you are out back in the garden where it is quiet and you won't get hair everywhere. He's got a worn sheet draped about his shoulders you save for these occasions and you've wet down his hair and are sectioning out the back. It's not like you've got your clips here and the man has a crazy thick head of hair, so you do this twisty-knotty thing with each section to keep them out of the way.

God, when was the last time he had this done? He looks like he hacked at his hair with a knife at some point. Like, hacked at it badly, kind of hacked at it.

"What?" you ask, or, rather, you try to ask. You may be holding tight to Mistress Thistlewool's prized sewing shears between your lips. No matter your mother's instruction, you still haven't mastered using the comb and holding the scissors at the same time. "You don't have pirates here?" you ask around the shears as you twirl a hank of his hair on the right and knot it back on itself before you comb out a section from his back.

"Oh, aye, they are a scourge upon the folk of Gondor about the Bay of Belfalas, and would pass through to the northern waters of the Anduin were it not for the vigilance of the Men of Pelargir. They are not a foe to take lightly," he says, and when he goes on you roll your eyes behind his back, "but you will not find a single one with so commonplace and dull a name."

Look, the fabulous geography lesson for which you have no context aside, the absurdity of the name is clearly the point.

"Yeah, well, what you make up for in pirates, you certainly lack in sense of humor," you say and he scoffs.

"I would have you know-" he starts, but the opportunity is just too good to pass up.

"Yeah, yeah, they shouldn't call you Stick at Naught," you say, grinning as you snip away at the ends of a section of his hair, "they should call you Stick Up His -"

Apparently that one didn't need translation, because Estel interrupts you with a sudden, "Hala!

"I will answer to no such name," he goes on, all authoritative and shit.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Big bad Strider. All crunchy and growly on the outside.

You pull the edge of the comb from crown to nape, separating out another section of hair along the back of his head before you go back to snipping.

Your mother was a hairdresser, old fashioned beauty parlor, women in rows underneath beehive hair dryers, linoleum floors, worn out copies of Ebony and Style in wire baskets, and the smell of barbicide redolent over hairspray and bleach. After school, you'd prop up your textbooks on the sinks in between helping wash hair since you were a kindergartener.

You wonder what would happen if you give Estel a nice, military-grade, 'Sir! Yes sir!,' high and tight. Probably nothing good. Not that you aren't tempted. The look on his face in that first moment of discovery might just be worth it.

Nah. Maybe not. He doesn't have the ears for it.

As it is, his hair is going to be a little shorter than he asked for once it dries. It's a rat's nest of shredded ends in some spots. But, it's thick and heavy, with the occasional thread of silver that glints in the sunlight, especially at his temples and over his ears. His hair's got a nice curl to it that is going to hang in waves about his neck once you're done with it. He's going to make someone a very fine looking DILF in a few years.

"A pity Farm Boy's departure was so sudden and he and Buttercup had naught of joy together," he says and you shrug, your eyes on what you're doing.

"Not like his prospects were terribly great where he was, what with his low status compared to hers. And so off he goes to make his way in the world and see what he could make of himself," you say, waving the comb about to make your point, and he makes a soft sound.

"I mean, who wants a relationship where you don't feel like you're bringing something of equal value to it, right?" you ask. He is very quiet for a while after that, all through the rest of the back of his hair and onto the left side.

It's surprisingly awkward. Once you move to his side you find there's this blank look on his face, like everything is locked down super tight again.

You can't help sighing. Well, shit. Things had been going so well. What the fuck did you just trip over and explode? He had talked for hours last night, his face lighting with the pleasure of watching you discover more about the world you had been plopped into.

You keep turning what you've learned over and over in your mind. The fact that this place had its own mythic versions of "The Big Flood" and "The Sinking of Atlantis" is kinda leaving you with an existential hangover this morning.

You don't want to talk about it. Not right now.

Pfft. Who are you kidding. Maybe never. Opens up way too many questions for Estel.

"Well, yeah," you say instead, "Westley did kind of leave Buttercup hanging there. 'You thought I was saying 'As you wish,' but you just weren't listening. I've been telling you I love you for years,' and then off he goes on this whole self-improvement kick just to earn the love of his Buttercup."

His hair looks awesome, if you don't say so yourself. You give his hair a shake, checking out the transition from side to back. Not bad. Oops. Nope, better take care of whatever it is that's sticking out there.

"Besides, you know, Buttercup did the same thing for him. She spent the time he was away on her own self-improvement program."

"I do not recall that," Estel says, life coming back into his face.

"Don't you remember?" you ask. His eyes follow you as you walk around to his right. For want of a spray bottle, you squeeze out the rag floating in the bucket at his feet and use that to dampen his hair as you untwist it. "I mean, she did actually start bathing, for one thing."

This startles a laugh from him. "Ah, my apologies, Hala. I think I may have fallen asleep ere you reached that part of the tale."

"I'll just have to repeat it again tonight."

"As you wish," he says, a slow smile creeping over his face.

"Funny," you say and grin. "You're funny. Look at you, Mr. Big Scary Strider, making a joke to prove me wrong about your sense of humor."

This makes him chuckle outright and so you just keep going.

"Yeah, yeah, you're all prickly on the outside, but I bet you have friends at every place you spend time actually getting to know people." You push at his scalp to get him to tilt his head.

"All but here," he says.

"Not true," you say and tap at the crown of his head with the comb. "You do now."

Despite the pink that's growing on his cheeks, he concedes the point with a smile and a small bow of the head. "Then I am blessed to have met you."

"Oh, I see, funny and a sweet-talker, too." You comb out his hair, eyeing how much healthy stuff he's got on this side. Looks like enough. "Yeah, yeah. I bet that everywhere you go, there's a fair share of people you meet who want to take a bite out of you."

And now he's not just pink, but a full throated red. I mean, he's gotta know the effect he has. He certainly made sure to keep his back turned to the extra traffic walking up and down the Road in front of your hut when he spent the afternoon chopping wood in no more than his braies. Not that it cleared the traffic any. In fact, given what the view looked like, it might have increased it.

He clears his throat and begins picking at a stray thread in the linen, still refusing to look at you. He grins and then wipes at his mouth as if that might stop the smile from spreading across his face. "There may be somewhat of truth to that," he says and you laugh.

Oh, yes. Absolutely adorable.

"Just wait," you say, splitting out a section over his ear and combing it out. You pick up some of the back section of hair to use as a guide and comb it in with the rest. "Hope those long legs of yours move fast, cuz when I'm done with you you are going to look so fine you better use them to run."

"Aye, cut hair, a shave, and clean clothes, and mayhap even Barliman shall like the look of me," he says with a wry huff.

"Well, maybe not him," you allow. Barliman did have rather set opinions about what was and was not proper and changed them about as often as he changed the inn's menu, meaning never, and not that being friends with you was going to get Estel anywhere with the other citizens of Bree... "But you at least have me here," you finally settle on saying.

He doesn't respond to that, but a smile lingers on his face while he sits with his eyes closed, and, well, that's good enough, you suppose.

Done with the side, you then stand in front and pull strands down on either side of his jaw, checking to make sure you haven't accidentally given him Bree's version of an "I want to see your manager, but your lord or chief will do" asymmetrical bob. A snip here and there and it's looking pretty good. He keeps his eyes closed and lets you run your fingers through his hair, shaking it to dry it a little and settle it into place. You've layered the ends heavily so it's going to look less like he's wearing a bush on his head and it will probably retain its shape a bit longer than his usual.

"There," you say, swiping at stray clippings on his neck with a cloth. "Still thinking you might be able to trust me with that shave?"

His eyes pop open. "I meant naught by it," he says, insistent, as you lift the sheet off of him and shake it out. When you grin back at him, he gives you a sour look, which of course only makes you snicker. "Had you as many shaves with a dull knife as have I, you, too, would check your barber's blades." He gets up from the stump on which he had been sitting as you shake out the cloth. He then runs his hands through his hair from forehead to nape and fluffs out the ends, getting a feel for his new cut.

"Aw, baby has sensitive skin, does he?"

He makes a small sound of either impatience or dismissal, but you're having a hard time taking him seriously as he's already settling to the ground in front of the stump where you've pointed him. Master Reedy has a whole fancy setup of tall chairs that recline and a system of footstools and sinks and tables. You, however, have to make do with a multipurpose stump, the ground, and your lap. But, at least you come cheap, and your customers don't have to listen to their fellow Bree-landers scream as they get their teeth pulled.

You've fished a length of well-worn wool from a pot simmering on a small fire in the garden hearth. By the time you've finished waving it about and letting steam roll off of it and got it folded into a long rectangle, it's cool enough, and so you grab up the folded blanket, plop it over your lap, and take your turn sitting on the stump behind Estel.

"Lay back," you say, encouraging him to rest his back and head on the blanket. Round the wool goes about his face, scrunch it together on his cheeks, leave his nose and mouth free, and now you've got nothing to do but sit on the stump, let him lay his head on your lap, and allow the hot cloth do its work before you whisk the soap up into a lather.

Well then.

He's all stretched out, his legs crossed at his ankles and his hands clasped in his lap. He's not bothered wearing his long vest or coat, so he's still got his sleeves rolled up for work. He has got some nice cordage going on in his forearms and he really is deft with those big hands of his. You really really really want to take your thumbs to his temples and neck, maybe break down some of those knots he's got in his face and shoulder muscles. Not only does he not sleep much, he doesn't sleep terribly well just in general. It wasn't just the fever that made him restless and easily woken.

You fold your arms against your front and clear your throat, squinting into the bright light of the afternoon.

"So, uh, last night," you say and he grunts lightly in response when you pause as if to encourage you to continue. "I have a few questions."

He doesn't say anything, but there's this tension to his shoulders and arms that wasn't there before.

Hoo, boy. This is a bad, bad idea.

"So, elves, huh?" you say anyway.

"Aye, what of them?"

"They, uh, really exist then."

This elicits a very long pause.

See? You knew this was a bad idea. God damn it. Please don't ask. Don't ask. Don't ask. What the hell are you going to say if he asks this time?

"You have not met any?"

"But you have, like really met them, not like you know a guy whose cousin's friend met one one time and they're really, truly not pulling a fast one."

"I have met many," he says, and then, after a pause, goes on, "and once lived amongst them."

Oh. Well fuck, then. You're going to have to completely re-evaluate some of the stories told at The Pony.

"Trolls?"

"You should count yourself lucky should you never chance upon one! It has been some time since I have had the misfortune of seeing one, but aye, atimes they are still found in the foothills of the Misty Mountains east of here.

"Dragons?"

"Aye, though 'tis said there are few if any left," he says. "I have met those whose efforts led to the release of the people of Erebor from the terror of one such and heard their tale. One day I shall tell it to you, or should I not, you could meet them for yourself." His voice has warmed considerably and he smiles. "Indeed, one yet resides in the house of Elrond the Halfelven and has the skill to tell the full tale in verse, should he so choose. Though last we spoke he was having some trouble deciding his course in the matter."

Huh. Okay. So, yes - friends in other places that he stays. And yes - dragons, though they seem to be thankfully close to extinction. And also yes - Elrond, the mythical Rivendell, and intermarriage between Elves and Men. You're learning so much and Estel hasn't asked why you don't know this and where the hell you come from that this is all new to you. This is going a lot better than you thought it would.

Steam no longer rises from the wool on Estel's face. You should probably start whisking up the soap. You lay the back of your hand on the cloth on his forehead and cheek. Hmmm. Maybe you have time for a couple more questions.

"Vampires?"

This one seems to give him pause. He rubs his thumbs against one another and shifts his legs. "I am unsure," he says, falling still again. "I, myself, have not seen one, nor have I heard a direct account of them. Our tales are full of bats of these type in the First Age of the world, but they do not feature in tales of the later ages."

Oh, okay, so not Count Dracula kind of vampires. Elves, check. Trolls, yep. Vampires, not recently.

"Okay, so where do orcs come from, really?"

"Ai! There, Hala," he says, "is a tale long in the telling and of which the truth of the matter is yet under debate. Indeed, accounts of it go back to the beginning of all the tales."

Okay, well maybe you should get settled in, then. You pluck the Estel-approved straight-edged blade out of the cup and set it aside and the wooden-handled brush knocks about in the cup when you reach down and pick it up. You'd added some hot water in there before you sat down and the soap has softened up enough, you think.

But then Estel rips the cloth from off his face and launches himself to his feet with such speed he leaves a draft of air behind in his wake. You blink at him. And then you hear the footsteps, brisk and kicking stones before it.

"Oi, Fish! Fish? Where are you? I know you're here," comes a loud voice from the front of your house and getting closer.

Ah. You drop the brush back in the cup.

It's Hazel's mother, the matriarch of the family. You can recognize her voice. You knew this was coming. It's just coming a lot earlier than you were hoping.

Estel spares you a quick glance as you set the cup on the ground and lift the blanket off your lap. You wave him off and he stops doing his impression of a very alert and very large guard dog, though he still watches the gate into the garden warily.

"I'm back here, Mistress Penniwort."

She appears at the gate in her wide brimmed straw hat, thick about the middle and her bosom flowing over the top of her ill-fitting stays.

"There you are," she declares. Her life has worn lines in her face and roughened her hands. She's one of the few here who still greet you politely, if not pleasantly, but no "hello," no "good day to ye" today. Her discontent sours her features. "You and I have business to discuss."

Yep, you sure do, and so you let her through the gate. She halts a few steps in, catching sight of Estel, who has, somehow, for all his height and commanding presence, melted into the shadows behind your hut where he watches silently.

"Oh, and hallo to you, too, -" she says, taking Estel in from head to toe and back, completely uncertain as to what name to use to greet him.

He nods, his arms crossed on his chest.

Yeah, he's going to do that thing, isn't he, where he uses his big shoulders and silence to make people uncomfortable. Damn, he's good at it, too. When you escort Mistress Penniwort into the garden, her eyes keep flicking over to him.

"Estel," you say, "would you mind bringing the bench out here so Mistress Penniwort can have something to sit on, please?"

Well, that was certainly not what he expected, but after a moment of hesitation, he jerks himself off the wall where he was leaning and disappears inside.

That, of course, gives Mistress Penniwort just the perfect opportunity.

"I had not given the gossip credit and thought you had more wit than this, to take such a man as him in," she whispers, glancing about the corner as if Estel would pop back up before she took two steps.

"Mistress Penniwort," you say before she has the chance to say anything else that Estel is very likely to hear. You don't bother lowering your voice. It doesn't matter. "There are a lot of things we need to discuss, but Strider is not one of them."

About forty emotions make their way across her face all at once, not the least of which is affront. She finally settles on exasperation as she shakes her head.

"How is Hazel?" you ask when Estel has returned with the bench and you've settled the Mistress on it across from where you're sitting on the tree stump. She's taken off her hat and is fanning herself with it. You, however, are not going to take the hint and offer her water. She's not going to be here long enough for it.

"Not well, no thanks to you," she says and pins you with a grim glare.

For an opening gambit, it's not bad. You decide to go ahead and cut to the chase. Not like you haven't had this argument before.

"I offer my pledge to the only man who will accept me and I'm a lot worse off than I am now, and you know it."

And bang goes the starter pistol and we're off and running.

"And whose fault is that but your own," she says and jerks her chin in the direction of the fields behind you. "What did you think would happen after that nonsense you put us through? We would have left a good harvest to rot last fall had you your way. What would ye have to eat then, eh?"

"I thought that cotters like you, and me, and your daughter deserved the same justice under the charter as the rest of Bree."

"Justice," she says and presses her lips together, shaking her head. "There's naught of justice to be found when your kin and children's ears are stopped up with six feet of dirt above them for the lack of harvest to eat o'er the winter. And here we are again. 'Twas your fine ideals that landed us in that mess, where are they now, eh?"

"The same place they were before!" you say, raising your voice over hers. Damn it. You need to get a grip on yourself. You lower your voice. "If we had stuck together -"

She makes a rude noise interrupting you. "Those who knew better stuck together well enough."

Yeah, they had. Apparently the landless cotters of Bree didn't need to learn a damn thing about collective action from you after all, because they all collectively acted to throw you under the bus.

"Are you here to argue that you want to handle this the same way? Cuz, I could definitely see my way to simply keeping Mistress Blackthorn's work all for myself if that's the way you're going to be."

"'Tis your foolishness that got us into this and 'tis on you to get us out again."

"No it isn't," you say, "not the way I see it. As far as I'm concerned I have everything to lose by refusing Mistress Blackthorn's work, who is likely to deny me any and all work in a fit of temper as a result, and absolutely nothing to lose by keeping things the way they are right now."

And now you're at a standstill. She knows it, too. Her face pinched, she stares at the ground with her hands upon her knees.

Well, she definitely can't argue that you'd lose the good will and cooperative support of the working class citizens of Bree, cuz that already dried up and blew away after they negotiated a deal with the landowners to end the strike that did not include you.

You really hadn't meant to make yourself an outcast in Bree. You may have been one of the first to push for action, but you were not alone. It doesn't help that you had no ties of family here, no years spent in mutual aid to have at least earned some loyalty. No one to rally to your defense. So, here you sit in your one room hut and wonder what it will take to survive the winter, an object lesson to your fellows.

You bite at your lip. Yeah, yeah, you've got the upper hand here, finally, but you have got to play your cards right.

I mean, listen, you do feel for Mistress Penniwort. Her children are grown, but that just means they're starting to have their own babies. She's got a house full of toddlers, young children, and a husband who is ailing and not long for this world. Every one of the adults and older children in that house are under the pledge and their pledgeholder can speak for them before the Council. No one dares take advantage of them. And yet they have to hustle for work just as hard as you do to keep all those mouths fed. She's just as stuck as you are.

"Offer me something," you say and hope she'll believe the earnestness you are attempting to convey.

"What have I to offer you that is not the bread from my own babies' mouths?" she asks sharply, but you shrug.

"You know what I need."

"Aye." She sighs and rubs roughly at her face before returning to dangling her straw hat between her knees. She shakes her head. "I cannot convince a man to do what he won't. They'll not listen to the likes of me, the holders of the pledge. They'll not take your oath, not a one of them but Ferny."

Well that's not going to happen. You'd be fucked.

"Next best thing, then," you say.

C'mon. C'mon. This doesn't have to end with you starving out one of the best-liked family of cotters in Bree.

"Best I can do for you and not dig my own grave is throw you the work we can't do," she says, "though we'd be sacrificing Master Woodruff's good will for it, since it is to him and his kin we would most oft send it."

Huh. Okay. Good start. He was your co-conspirator and the first to turn his back on you.

"Okay, I still keep the mending work, though," you say and she nods. It's no skin off her nose. You were already doing that before. "Can you get the other washerwomen to refuse Mistress Blackthorn's work so she can't undercut both of us."

She scoffs loudly. "Who but you and I would work for the woman?"

"Aye, aye," she says, waving the hat at you when you glare at her. You are so not going to leave it up to chance. "I shall see to it. Have we a deal, then?"

"Promise to take me with you to your pledgeholder's hall for the winter feast he holds for his oathmen and we will."

"What do ye want with that?" she asks, a little surprised and a lot annoyed.

Yeah, no, she's not going to make a deal with you and then return to pretending you don't exist like everybody else, not when you're doing her a favor. What you really want is the chance to sit next to your fellow workers and make them acknowledge your existence. And maybe, maybe, if you're very lucky, begin working on a chance to start over again.

You shrug. "Maybe I just like his roasted pig?" you say and she rolls her eyes.

"Very well, aye! But only should you promise not to embarrass me and mine in front of them."

"I shall do my very best," you say and hold out your hand.

"The Valar help us, then."

You'd spit in your palm before you shook if you thought it might stick better. After a moment in which her distaste for the deal is very evident in her face, Mistress Penniwort takes your hand in her rough grip and it is done.

You give her well wishes to pass on to her daughter, which she grudgingly accepts. You learn in turn that she had a healthy baby boy for which you then pass on your congratulations. And, well, that's that, at least for now. Could have gone better. Could have gone worse. You suppose that's the best you can hope for.

When you return from escorting Mistress Penniwort to the gate, you find Estel watching from the shadows behind the hut with a curious look in his eye. For a guy that big, he can make himself surprisingly unobtrusive. You'd almost forgotten he was there.

"So, you heard all that, huh." You pick the blanket up off the ground and slap it against your knees to knock off the grass and dirt before laying it on the bench. He joins you, straddling the bench and watching as you clean off the comb and wipe down the scissors, laying them in a pile on the blanket.

"I confess it answers things I had puzzled over," he says, his voice low, "why you have no callers and no steady work."

Yeah, you suppose he knows enough about Bree society to have picked up on that already. Most often the working class of Bree bind themselves together in these little clusters of mutual aid societies underneath their pledgeholder. Not that you know much of what that's like from the inside, but it's uncommon to live alone and apart like you do. It's like walking around with a big scarlet "loser" sign on your forehead.

"Did it achieve what you wished it to, the strike against the harvest?" he asks while you pluck grass off the blanket where it still clings. You're having a hard time looking at him.

You lift a shoulder in a half-hearted shrug. "Yeah, I mean, they amended Bree's charter to close that loophole and the landowners can't cheat the cotters of their wages the way they used to, so, yeah, pretty much."

He nods, something of grim satisfaction in his look. He lets loose a very long breath and shakes his head.

"You took money out of their pockets, my friend," he says as you cast around for the straight-edge knife.

"Yep." There it is. It had fallen off the stump into the grass.

"I am surprised Barliman gives you work. He sits high on the Bree Council."

"He was sympathetic, or at least he said so when he complained that his hands were tied."

Yeah, if Estel's face is anything to go by, he's just as skeptical as you were.

"Besides," you go on, wiping off the knife on the blanket, "no skin off his nose. The loophole wasn't something he could use. And he's too busy to train anybody else up, anyway."

"Have a care, my friend," Estel says. "Barliman may be sympathetic, but there is only so much he can afford to tolerate. His profits ride upon his reputation. His winters, too, would be long and lean when traffic upon the road dwindles, were it not for the regulars who keep his common room full."

"Yeah." You toss the straight-edge onto the blanket, your throat tightening around anything you might have added to that.

Yeah, he's not telling you anything you don't already know. You lose that job and you are officially screwed. It's the only semi-reliable work you have. You might as well go lay your body down someplace in a field somewhere and let the crows do their work.

"Still sure you want to be friends with me?" You really are attempting to make light of the whole situation, how toxic you've become, but given the quaver in your voice you just can't control you've shot pretty wide of your mark. To be honest, as crappy as you feel, you probably couldn't hit the broad side of a barn about now.

He smiles crookedly and nods at the pile of your tools on the blanket. "More so than I trust you with that straight blade of yours upon my neck."

You're startled into a snort. "Oh really? Yeah?" you ask and he rises from the bench. He walks away, running his fingers through his hair, pushing it away from his face and settling it behind his ears to hang in soft curls about his neck.

You don't know where the fuck he is going. Not like he's got his own room to hide away from you in.

"Yeah? Just for that, smartass, guess who's not getting a shave today," you yell at his back, but all you get in response is the sound of Estel chuckling.

Damn it. Now you're going to have to think of a way to get back at him.