Faramir Took was bone-achingly tired. By all standards, it had been a long day; he was no longer terrified of Ents, but found them overwhelmingly boring. He sat on a younger Ent, whose name was Mithorn. She did not engage much conversation and mostly she mumbled musically to herself. He wanted to sleep, but the height of which he found himself, he hardly allowed himself to blink. He looked for the other hobbit-children and saw them amongst the tree forms of the Ents. He looked in concern at Goldilocks, a tiny form on a huge She-Elm, no doubt that she was crying.
Frodo had tried to convince the Entwives that they had the wrong hobbits. To no avail; they would not let them go, especially after he had revealed that he knew where Fangorn was. He received in return, a slap behind the head from Gary with the comment, "like the Ents, you must either be thick or hollow in the head, ya dumb piece of wood." Fortunately he said it soft enough so not to offend the eager Ents.
He couldn't help but feel extremely worried; he had poured over his father's maps and had listened to his stories, and he had a fair idea where Fangorn lay; but his main concern would be if they became lost. What could the Ents do to them? He suddenly wished that he had taken up the offer of cleaning the stables when he had the chance.
Suddenly the Ents stopped, beginning to sway in the feeble moonlight.
"What's happening Mithorn?" he asked the Ents he was riding.
"We have come to a stop."
"I know that. Can you tell me why?"
"Our limbs and boughs are tired, because we have walked longer and farther than we have done in an age, not since we escaped from our old lands far into the east and south. We are going to sleep now, near the river we have just past, and we will rest until the sun is in the east. We will set off again later tomorrow."
"In other words: 'we're stopping to make camp and we will leave in the morning', we don't need the extra information. We Hobbits are not exactly a quick people, but we do like to get to the point within thirty minutes."
Mithorn either seemed to have missed the barb, or she had ignored it, "Young child, you must learn to respect the finer things in life: life without detail cannot be called life, as it has nothing in it."
And she set the young hobbit on the ground, she stretched and stood still.
How queer he thought. He started to walk around and soon found the other four. Tom Bombadil had left them with supplies: blankets, spare clothes, food and the like; but it hardly seemed fair that they had shouldered this immense responsibility. All of them looked worse for wear, lying down in the spongy grass, breathing raggedly, covering themselves with blankets.
Faramir lay down between Goldilocks and Pip, and he began to gaze at the stars, bejewelling the heavens in light. Just within the range of hearing, some river flowed gently and the crickets sang. Some Ents mumbled in their sleep and the warm wind sighed through their leaves. Under different circumstances, this would have been a glorious night.
"Ugh, I think I have an enormous splinter in my butt…" said Gary.
"Thanks for spoiling the mood, butt-head." Goldilocks said sharply, turning her back away from the offender. Faramir could feel her frustration falling off her like waves of heat. He waited for the retort from Gary, but it never came; it seemed that he had fallen asleep. As nervous as he was, Faramir could not resist the call of dreamless sleep.
TBC