It was early on the morning and already the sun seemed to be bearing all of its heat down on the guards Beren and Eldacar. This was not a good way to start the day's – Day Three – searching, as emotional temperatures tended to rise when the literal temperature did and the two search partners (indeed, pretty much everyone participating in the search) were already on pins-and-needles as it was. Yesterday's search, despite its promising start with the king and prince's decisive plans and leadership, had yielded no results: Prince Eldarion and the three princesses were still missing and no one had yet to find any sign of them.

The plan itself was the best one that anyone could have come up with and the ensuing search couldn't have been executed better; the reason why nothing had come of it after one day had nothing to do with any flaws concerning either of those, but because of the simple fact that even though they'd managed to cut the search area down considerably the day before there was still a lot of land to comb. The searchers had to investigate twelve leagues of earth in every direction except south, which was a daunting enough task without having the additional requirement of having to do a thorough job of it. Progress had to happen at its excruciating but necessary slow pace, for no one wanted to be responsible for overlooking an important clue and thus condemning the lost children to wandering and death.

It also didn't help matters that there were relatively few people participating in the search. King Elessar had made the difficult but ultimately best decision to not call in Gondor's army for additional assistance. The temptation of having so many extra bodies scouring the lands had lessened greatly when the king considered how many hours of daylight they would lose in sending for the army and then having to reconvene everyone so that the newcomers could be briefed and the plan altered to accommodate all of them. There was also the potential that evidence would be lost if so many feet trampled over the landscape that they needed to yield up clues. Besides, the soldiers didn't know the royal children all that well; not only might they overlook a clue that could have been readily identified as significant by a guard who knew them better but also, considering what the children had just been put through and by whom, Prince Eldarion and Princess Laurelin probably wouldn't be inclined to trust someone that they only vaguely acquainted with. For better or worse the task of searching and finding belonged to the royal family (minus the hobbits, who were seeing to it that Tanondor was as miserable as possible right then) and the royal guards. All that they could hope for was that it would be enough.

Eldacar wasn't so sure that it would be anymore. Intellectually he understood that they'd made admirable progress so far, especially considering how much land they had to search, but emotionally it was difficult not to feel discouraged. He was too unfamiliar with the land in those parts to feel like he really had a handle on where they were and where they were heading; and the leagues that seemed to loom ahead of him and his search partner appeared so vast and complex in his eyes. On top all that he was one of the guards who'd been sent on Prince Legolas' impromptu mission of riding out and then backtracking in search of tokens that the crown prince might have left behind him; and that task was slowly costing Eldacar his sanity.

It hadn't taken long for the guards on that assignment to realize that they would cover a lot more ground if they divided the land that needed to be searched among pairs. As it usually happened given his lack of experience when compared to the others the young Man had been paired with Beren and together they had set out to comb the river edge and immediately surrounding areas. This in itself would have been fine had Eldacar not been spotting what he deemed to be potential tokens left and right since mid-day of Day Two. Not all of them could possibly been dropped by any one of the children (and in fact none of the ones that he had found so far had been) but he wanted so badly to find them, for something to draw a clear path to his goal, that his mind had begun seeking out anything and then imagining things that would make the so-called "token" he'd originally found make sense.

This did not bode well for the hapless and frustrated pair. Under normal circumstances Beren was a patient, if demanding, Man; but the stress of the children's kidnapping had been wearing him down for days. Now he was prone to snap at the slightest provocation – and having a fellow guard distracted by flights of hopeful fancy that threatened to hold up their search was something that he considered to be more than slight provocation. As the morning dragged on Eldacar had continued to drive Beren to the breaking point with each time he pointed out a ridiculously improbable lead or a bent branch that "could be a sign" until finally he managed to push the older Man right over the edge.

"Oh, for the Valar's sake!" Beren snapped on the river bank when Eldacar excitedly presented him with yet another token that made absolutely no sense. "Dare I ask what's going on in your head or is it too horrifying even for you to face?"

"The king said" – Eldacar started to protest.

"Yes, no stone unturned," Beren cut him off impatiently. "But I'm sure that he didn't mean for us to abandon all common sense. Please do us both a favor and think for a second: ask yourself where in Middle-earth would the prince and princesses have gotten a cowbell?"

"Well, Tanondor could have packed it," reasoned Eldacar lamely. "And they could have taken it because…because they needed it as…as a signal…"

Beren reminded himself firmly that he had more to lose than gain by maiming the young Man before him. "A signal," he repeated scornfully. "And what reason would Tanondor have to pack it in the first place?"

"He was going to see the lady that he claims to love," said Eldacar in a small voice. He gave the bell a little shake that grated on Beren's last nerve and the older guard tensed, his eye twitching. "Perhaps it's some kind of love token; a metaphor" –

In an instant Beren snatched the bell away from him and threw it against the mud with all of his might. "A metaphor?" he asked incredulously. "Have you ever been around a nobleman before, Eldacar? They give the males in their lives ridiculously ornate weapons that are useless in real combat situations and they give females overvalued pieces of gaudy jewelry, not cowbells that are laden with metaphors! Even if Tanondor had gotten creative in his insanity, his breeding wouldn't allow him to give the lady or any other woman anything that didn't have jewels on it. Tell me, Eldacar," he added, sucking in a deep breath to replace the air he'd lost during his rant, "is that filthy, dingy, rusted bell encrusted with jewels?"

"No," conceded the younger Man in the quietest voice that he possessed without whispering as he fought with himself not to take a step back. If anything, it was Beren's demeanor that was making him doubt that the search would end successfully more than anything else. While he'd always had a bit of a short temper when it came to incompetence shown by those under his command, in the past the older guard had always maintained a level of self-control that projected a countenance image of confidence. It had always been comforting for Eldacar to believe that Beren had a handle on the situation but now that image was crumbling fast and it scared him.

"No," echoed Beren, willing himself to calm down.

Against his better judgment Eldacar couldn't help blurting out: "But where else could it have come from?"

Apparently he was trying to calm down prematurely. "There are farms in this area," Beren practically growled. "Not like peasant farms where families only have a little plot of land that's barely big enough for a garden but ones with farmers who are somewhat wealthier. They own large plots of land to build their homes, grow their food, and graze their livestock which includes – yes, you guessed it – cattle. When they have need to take their cattle to another farm they walk the cows close to the river so that they don't have to worry about veering off of their original course or hauling water. Either some cow lost the bell on that sort of trek or else some hooligan stole it and discarded it here; but that doesn't matter to us, as it has nothing to do with why we're out here! Just leave it for someone else to find!"

"All right, all right, I'm sorry," burst out Eldacar in what was probably not the most respectful tone that he could have used. At least he was trying; what was Beren contributing?

"You should be," glowered Beren in an equally unpleasant voice. The two stood there glaring at each other for a beat before the older Man stiffly pointed away from the river. "Why don't you go inland and see if you can find anything that might give us some inkling that we're on the right track? Let me know at once if you find anything that might actually be a clue or a token. In other words," he added, spiteful in his frustration, "if you stumble across another cowbell I don't want to hear about it."

Ordinarily Eldacar would have felt extremely resentful about the callous dismissal and the condescending way that Beren was treating him. At the moment, however, he really needed to get away from his search partner before he got into any more trouble by punching his commander. "Yes sir," he got out through gritted teeth. After a moment where neither of them broke their mutual glare the young Man tore his eyes away, turned abruptly, and walked off angrily in the direction that Beren indicated.

Not completely thoughtless in his aggravation the young guard took pains to scour everything around him as he stalked on, careful not to crush anything underfoot unnecessarily. There was no clear trail leading from the river to the more wooded area and beyond but the space between the trees was sufficiently wide enough and the grass was brown and bent forward until it was almost lying flat, making it easy enough to move between the tall trees without one. Eldacar guessed that was also due to the movements of the farmers.

The sun beat down on him through the sparse limbs. Everything seemed especially bright in Eldacar's exhausted eyes and he tried in vain to shield himself completely from the light. His feet blindly followed a natural path that appeared to be leading to what looked to be a small clearing up ahead. 'Well, I'd call that a natural place to look,' the guard decided. As he continued on he found himself marveling at how clearly he could still hear the sound of the river flowing; even when he stepped out into the meadow –

"Oh Valar," mumbled Eldacar in shock, forgetting all about the river. He stopped short and goggled at what he'd just discovered. A mirage – it had to be a mirage, the result of too much sun, not enough sleep, and heightened levels of annoyance – but the sight didn't go away after he blinked several times.

Now there were signs and there were signs and this was definitely the latter. "Beren!" he called as loudly as he could, disregarding his previous anger in his excitement. "Beren, come quickly! I found something!"

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

'Babies are either truly miraculous creatures or the biggest joke that the Valar could play on people,' decided Eldarion as he continued to trudge along, Laurelin stumbling along at his side and his infant sisters in each of their slings. 'Or maybe they're both.'

There was something maddening about Gilraen and Meren's lack of logic that was beginning to eat away at the boy's nerves. Eldarion had helped out his ada with the babies when his papa had been recovering from his illness but he hadn't realized the full extent of their irrational tendencies until now. They cried when they had a dirty diaper and they cried when someone tried to give them a new diaper. The two babies screamed at the top of their lungs when they were hungry and right after they ate when they felt sated. They carried on incessantly when they were tired, fighting the sleep that he could only dream of giving into while they were still in the wilderness, and when they awoke after a long rest that Eldarion was coveting very badly at the moment. They peed and pooped so often that the boy was surprised that there was anything left inside of them. And, most disconcertingly of all, they ate far more than he'd anticipated.

Funny, it didn't seem like a lot when he was feeding them in his parents' antechamber and now they were about to pay dearly for him not taking the distortion of always having another bottle on hand into consideration as he planned their hasty escape. All too soon Eldarion had started to notice how much lighter his bottle-filled pack was getting; a realization made all the more unsettling and frightening by the fact that he'd seen to it that they used what was in his sister's pack first. There was no way around it: the twins' food wasn't going to last for much longer if he didn't start doing something different soon.

But what was there for Eldarion to do to conserve it? He couldn't very well not feed them every time that they were hungry. Unlike Laurelin, who was old enough to understand her circumstances well enough, Meren and Gilraen couldn't be reasoned with. They would continue to cry, drawing the attention of Elbereth-knows-what, until they were satisfied. All that crying would take it out of them too; Eldarion knew that the twins wouldn't survive for too long if they were weak from both exhaustion and starvation and he wouldn't be able to look his parents in the eye again if – when – they were found if something were to happen to them. Nor could he produce more food out of thin air. What he needed was to think of a more creative solution.

The wild berries that he and Laurelin had been nibbling on wouldn't work – they needed something liquid – he could try crushing some of those berries – but that would take too long and not make enough for both of the babies – he needed something that was abundant in its liquid form – like water, except water didn't have the nourishing properties of food – if only he could combine…. That was it! Yes, yes, maybe he could find a way of making what they did have left stretch some more. "Laurelin, stop," he ordered. "Let's top off our waterskins and…and work on making the babies' food last a little longer."

Laurelin looked at him as if she was trying to read his mind and, despite everything else, Eldarion had to hide his smile. He was sure that his proper and girly little sister would be mortified to know that the long blonde hair that she took so much pride in was all snarled and disheveled. She would be equally embarrassed by how her dress was stained by mud and sweat and how she was in dire need of a lengthy bath. Then again, Laurelin hadn't been that person since after he'd bested the insane lord and enlisted her help; she'd grown up. Or else he'd grown up; perhaps they both had. "What are we going to do?" she asked.

"We have a bunch of empty bottles – they outnumber the full ones, at any rate," elaborated Eldarion with an excitement that was fueled by desperation. "I was thinking that we take the food that we have felt and pour some of it into those bottles until every one that has something in it is half full. Then we can fill them to the top with water." His heart sank a bit when he saw her biting her lower lip. "What? Is it no good?"

"Isn't that kind of like taking away half of our food and mixing what we have left with water?" questioned Laurelin uncertainly. "That wouldn't be enough to fill us up and it wouldn't be enough for Meren and Gilraen if we did it to them. Besides, drinking water when I'm hungry only makes me hungrier. If they get hungry they're going to cry and we won't have any non-watered down food to make them better if we do that."

Eldarion was a little taken aback. "Well, maybe we could just…do a couple of them…." His voice trailed off as he looked down into each of his baby sisters' peacefully sleeping faces. The lightness of his pack felt even more keen than usual and he knew that he couldn't risk what food they had left like that without some serious thought. "Oh, hang it. Let's just sit down for a minute – I need to think."

The little girl had no arguments against that. With his help in supporting Meren Laurelin managed to carefully settle down next to him. A few moments passed by in heavy silence as he stared out at the water as if in deep contemplation and she tried to look everywhere but at him. Finally she couldn't take the quiet any longer. "Are we going to be all right?" she wondered earnestly.

There was no blame in Laurelin's tone but Eldarion couldn't help feeling that perhaps there should be. What had he been thinking, hauling three little children into the wilderness like he had? They might already have been back with their parents in Minas Tirith if he'd had them follow the cart trail. Yes, maybe Lord Tanondor would have come after them and the rain would have washed it away but that was what whoever was searching for them would have taken – there was a chance that they could have been found by a searcher before the rain it and Lord Tanondor came along. Heck, maybe he should have pretended to go along with the crazy lord's plan; he could have concentrated on subtly protecting his sisters until they got to Dol Amroth, where there would have been a lot of people around to help them get home.

Eldarion stared into Laurelin's face and almost wept. She was so young and trying with all her might to be brave but she couldn't hide the fact that she was scared and hungry. If the babies' food was running low, theirs was almost gone. He'd had them eating berries to keep from using up what they had left but what good would it do to hoard that last remaining small loaf of bread if it went moldy? "Here," he said, reaching into one of the baskets and producing the bread. He carefully broke off two sizable chunks and handed one to his sister. "Have some of this."

"Are you sure?" she asked, desperate to take it but unsure if she should after all of his talk about rationing.

No he wasn't sure; he wasn't sure that anything he'd done or was doing was right at the moment. Oh, he knew that the needed practice at making difficult decisions so that he would know how to do it when he became king but why did his first go at it have to have so much at stake? Still, he could only do what he judged to be best and right now that seemed to be getting a little food and hope into Laurelin. "Of course I am, silly," he said in a consciously light tone.

"Thank you," said Laurelin gratefully, snatching it up and stuffing a quarter of it into her mouth right away. Under Eldarion's gentle remonstrations about eating slowly she forced herself calm down and savor what she could. The two of them sat in silence, thoughtfully chewing the stale bread that tasted better than any meal they'd eaten at home, until none of their chunks were left.

Swallowing her last mouthful, the little girl felt both better and worse at the same time; one look at Eldarion and she knew that he felt the same way. What they both needed was a little distraction. "Please tell me a story, Eldarion," she requested.

"Do you have a particular one in mind?" he asked.

The only thing that she could think of was what she wanted more than anything. "Can you tell me about what it's going to be like when we see Ada and Papa again?"

"It's going to be wonderful," replied Eldarion emphatically without skipping a beat. He sent a silent prayer to the Valar that what he was describing would come to pass before the day was over with. "Ada and Papa are going to be so happy to see us; they're going to kiss us and hug us so tightly and they're not going to let us go until the rest of the family's complainig that they're hogging us gets too annoying. Then Ada and Papa are going to step aside enough so that we can see Daerada and Grandpa Gimli, and all of our aunts and uncles and all of them are going to hug and kiss us too."

"And the guards too," said Laurelin dreamily, a small smile cracking at the corners of her mouth. "And everyone else in the city will be so excited to see us."

Eldarion nodded encouragingly. "That they will," he continued on, letting his daydreams run free. He was surprised to find that he was drawing as much hope from the images in his head as he prayed he was giving to his sister by describing them. "We'll have to be in court for many days so that everyone can come and see for themselves that we're all right. After that Ada and Papa will decide that we've been through enough and don't need to go to any lessons for awhile. We'll have so much free time to play with everyone: Findowyn, Theomir, Elanor, Frodo, and all of the rest of them." He crinkled his nose playfully. "We have a lot of cousins, don't we?"

"I'll say," smiled Laurelin wistfully. She swore to herself that things were going to be different when she got the chance to see all of them again. She was going to be the best girl ever: no more being bratty to Findowyn when the older girl did something to mess up her hair or being mean to Theomir when she felt like being mean to someone. After all, the only reason that he dealt with her meanness was because he liked her so much; and really, there were yuckier boys than Theomir that could be following her around. And she wasn't going to be so obnoxious to Eldarion either; now that they were getting along she couldn't stand the idea of them going back to the way that they used to be and she was going to do everything she could to make sure that it didn't happen.

She felt her insides warm up pleasantly at the thought of being surrounded by so many people who cared about her again. "What else?" she asked eagerly. "Do you think that there will be a party for us?"

"Well, my birthday celebrations is coming up soon," said Eldarion, considering. "I don't know if they'll have enough time to plan another party before then, but I'm sure that they'll say something about all of this sometime during that night. That'll be fun – my birthday parties are always fun, even when there's grown-up things that we have to do at them. Do you remember any of them, Laurelin?"

"All I remember is how I wanted you to dance with me last year," recalled Laurelin in a melancholy voice, as this was not her favorite memory. "You told me that I was pestering you and to go away."

"I'm sorry for that, Laurelin," apologized Eldarion – and he meant it – as he put his arm around her. If nothing else this misadventure had made him appreciate both the little girl and how much she looked up to him on a whole new level. Before all of this he used to imagine how wonderful things would be if she were to vanish but now at the side of the river he couldn't stand to think about life without her. "You have my word right now that I'll dance with you at my party."

"Really?"

"Really," confirmed Eldarion. "You can even have the first dance; you know, the one that they play that official music for every year. Wow," he added, his eyes watering as he stared off at nothing in the distance as the memories and daydreams began to overwhelm him. "I can practically hear the music now."

Laurelin, being young and a pretty literal creature, strained her ears to listen to what her brother could hear and ended up frowning. "All I can hear is cows," she reported in a disappointed voice.

Cows? Eldarion sat up straight and focused his hearing. Sure enough, there was the faint sound of mooing in the air, coming from somewhere in the distance inland. It had to be close by if he could hear it at all! "Oh dear Elbereth, I hear them too," he gasped, almost unable to believe it. Since he'd never heard of herds of wild cows anywhere, let alone around Gondor, he could safely assume that they were domesticated. Domesticated cows meant grazing lands, which meant farms, which meant that people where somewhere in their general vicinity. "Now I know where we are! We're in the farm country in the northern part of Gondor – we must be farther north than I thought. Oh well, no matter now; what does matter is that there's got to be people somewhere close to those cows."

"People?" she repeated. Her expression became a little fearful as she looked inland. "Are they people like that lord or will they be nice?"

"Nice," said Eldarion firmly. He had to be careful, of course, but from what he knew about these people they were content to do for themselves and be left alone. None of them would be too eager to get in bad with their king by doing something to his children. "I'm sure they'll be happy to send word to Papa and Ada about where we are. What do you say, Laurelin? Do you feel up to doing a little walking again?"

"Are you jesting?" asked Laurelin incredulously, laughing for pure joy as she supported Meren's head and rose carefully to her feet. "You did it, Eldarion; you found help for us. I'll walk wherever you tell me to whenever you tell me to do it."

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Beren groaned when he heard Eldacar's excited yell carry through the wind. He'd been so looking forward to the time they had to search apart; he needed it to gather his bearings and douse his temper before he had to face the younger Man again or else he was going to kill him. Now Eldacar was asking him to come and look at something, most likely some broken twig or a rusted tool that some clumsy farmer had dropped two months earlier! They were never going to find the prince and princesses if the other guard was allowed to keep this up unchecked.

Intent on giving Eldacar what for once and for all Beren stalked furiously through the trees, narrowing his eyes when he saw his partner's turned back. He conspicuously cleared his throat and felt his annoyance rise exponentially when the young Man didn't oblige by looking back at him. Fantastic – he was stuck searching with someone who got distracted by simple shapes, slight movements, and shiny things.

"This had better not be" – the older guard started as he walked up to Eldacar, before sight in the small meadow in front of them robbed him of all words.

There were baby bottles strewn all over the ground by a log that was set low in the muddy soil. They were all covered with dirt and other debris that had been stirred up by the storm a couple of days ago, but it was still plain to see that the bottles were full. Both of the guards mind was on the same thing: Tanondor had described how the children had "ransacked" his supplies, wasting many perfectly good things by leaving them behind when they escaped.

Eldacar ran forward, throwing himself on the ground and plucking up one of the precious clues. "It's of too fine a quality to belong to any farmer, peasant or not," he declared with some smug satisfaction as he wiped it clean with his hands to examine it closer yet. "Yes, these are definitely what that bastard packed. See? It's marked blue, just like his stupid color-coding system would have it."

"Which means that this is the starting point of the children's escape," said Beren, elated and willing to let that little bit of rudeness pass by unchecked. He clapped the younger Man on the back. "Good work, Eldacar – extremely good work."

"Thank you," replied Eldacar.

"You're welcome," said Beren, studying the landscape as far as his eye could see. "Now that we can see what they would have seen I can't find any other clear guide around except for the river; so that's what we must continue to follow. We've finally caught their trail, my young friend – I know it."

OOOOOOOOOOOOOO

The farmer's wife looked up from her cooking when her husband and their eldest son came into the kitchen. "It took you a long time to feed them today," she commented, nothing the scowl on the farmer's face. She offered him a sympathetic smile in response. "And those cows didn't sound too happy."

"It was those little hooligans again," groused the farmer, slamming the bucket he was holding onto the ground and stomping over to sit at the long table that was set a little ways away from the fire during the summer. He had every reason to fume, as he'd complained to said hooligans' father on several occasions and nothing had come of it. "They went and tipped three cows over sometime during the night. Back-breaking work, that is, getting them cows back on their feet. I don't see what reason those children could have to knock them over like that in the first place."

"No good reason – there's just not much else to do around here," pointed out his son as he joined his father at the table.

The farmer eyed him suspiciously. "You best not have ever done that when you were their ages," he said in a tone that warned the son that he wasn't yet old enough not to be taken across his father's knee. The young Man shook his head earnestly and the farmer snorted. "Good. Of all the excuses," he added, scoffing derisively. "If they need something to do they should just come see me. I'll find plenty for them to do; and it'll be honest work too, not making more work for other people."

The Man's wife smiled to herself as she pulled a loaf of bread out of the cooking fire. Her husband came up with that same solution every morning that he awoke to fine a cow tipped over. She couldn't help but love how the childish pranks had roused his spirited nature; she only wished that she could help solve the problem before it started doing bad things to his nerves. However, having no solution to that particular problem she decided to focus on what she could take care of: the bread. It was a little too hot to eat yet. Quickly she transferred it to a plate and walked to over to the window where it could cool in the fresh air.

She was just setting it down on the windowsill when an unusual sight caught her eye. "My dear," he called over to her husband. "There's someone coming up the walk."

"Who could that be so early?" wondered the farmer rhetorically. With a grunt he rose and once again went outside, muttering all the way that it had better not be one of those cow-tipping children unless they were coming to make things right. Immediately he saw that there were in fact two people coming up the walk; neither of them looked familiar and he definitely wasn't expecting any strangers. Cautiously he went to meet them halfway up the walk. "What can I do…"

The farmer's voice trailed off when he and the visitors had finally walked close enough to each other for him to get a good look at them. There were actually four people there: the boy and girl that he'd initially spotted walking and two babies that were lying in slings that were tied around either person. They were children, all of them, with no adults with them in plain sight and definitely not from those parts. For one thing, although the boy was shirtless and it was hard to see what the babies were wearing the little girl was wearing a dress that was too fancy to be the everyday wear of a farmer's daughter (although it was also too fancy to be as dirty as it was too). No one around there had eyes like theirs in such an unnatural shade of blue either. Most telling – and the thing that the farmer couldn't stop gaping at – was that every last one of them had pointy ears, just like the elves he'd heard tell about.

Elves, elves – the king was married to an elf. The farmer had never seen that elf – he disliked leaving his farm and as long as he had another person to run errands to Minas Tirith when needed he let them go while he stayed – but his son had, and he said that the prince consort was something special. The farmer also knew that the king and prince had children of their own (though he couldn't quite figure how that worked), but these couldn't be them. How likely was it that royalty had wandered onto his farm in such a state? "Is there anything I can help you with?" he asked, polite, curious, and uncertain.

Eldarion quickly studied him. Neither his eyes nor his instincts could sense anything evil or deceitful about this Man. His initial reaction to the sight of them had been polite without being too smooth, surprised by their appearance without being too rude, and the boy didn't miss how he'd searched the area behind them for any sign of adult supervision. The young prince tested the waters by giving him his most charming smile. "I'd be extremely grateful if you can," he said. He was having a hard time not laughing with utter relief but he didn't want the farmer to think that he was laughing at him. "We need someone to send word to our parents."

"Your parents?" repeated the farmer. "Are you lost? Why did your parents let you go wandering off on your own in the first place? Who are you anyway?"

There was no reason to deny it, not when they needed for this Man or someone else around him to go to their fathers anyway. "I'm Eldarion Telcontar," replied the boy politely. He left off the title, though; it seemed rude to throw that in someone's face when asking for such a big favor. "This is my sister Laurelin and our baby sisters Gilraen and Meren."

Eldarion and Laurelin – dear Valar, those were the names of Gondor's prince and princess; and hadn't there been talk about Prince Legolas expecting again? The Man hadn't heard about him giving birth but news traveled very slowly to them. "My goodness," the farmer breathed, bowing instantly. "You're King Elessar's children!"

"Yes we are and we need your help, please," Eldarion told him pleadingly. He needed a grown-up, not a royal subject! "Our parents don't know where we are and they haven't for about two or three days now. We need to send them a message as soon as possible."

"You mean you've been wandering around by your lonesome for that long?" demanded the farmer, his parental instincts kicking in. No wonder they were so filthy, and the poor boy looked about ready to drop from exhaustion. "Well, come in, come in! My wife's got breakfast almost ready; we'll get some food in you, and as soon as my son finishes eating he'll be happy to run a message anywhere you need it to go."

To be continued…