Warning for descriptions of severe injuries.

Chapter 10

Two nights after they left Bree, Lori fished her book from her pack, remembering Bilbo's request that she write about her journey. At least now she had something mildly exciting to put down.

She rolled one broken half of the graphite stick between her fingers, her thoughts drifting back to the incident with the three men. Aragorn hadn't gone hunting since that night. Instead, he'd bought some dried meat with the money from the rabbits he'd sold in Bree. There hadn't been any need for Lori to replace or replenish anything in town, but she'd started to wonder if she should have gotten something else.

"I was thinking," she said, settling the book in her lap. "Is there some place I could buy a knife or something to protect myself in case…" She trailed off. She didn't want Aragorn to think she didn't feel safe with him. "I mean, after we part ways."

Aragorn paused in repairing one of his arrowheads. "A weapon will not necessarily protect you if you do not know how to wield it. Someone stronger could easily take it and use it against you."

"Ah." Absently, she rubbed a hand against her thigh, imagining the bite of a knife piercing her stomach. It wasn't the first time the thought had crossed her mind.

"You will be safe with Adela. As long as I have known her, no bandit or thief has dared to harm anyone who crosses her threshold."

"Why?" A small part of her wondered if the woman was a witch in addition to a healer. From what she'd seen so far, she wouldn't put it past this world.

"Because she treats them, too. Often she is the only one that will take the vagabonds in. In some ways, she carries more power than any lord of this land once did."

Lori frowned, playing with the edge of the book cover. "You don't have a problem with that? That she treats bandits?"

"I see no evil in the healing of others. Part of my duty is to keep them from doing harm, but I would not condemn them all to die of sickness and injury."

"But those men who came into camp a few days ago…" She hesitated. "You would have fought them, if they hadn't backed down."

Aragorn nodded, a slight shadow passing over his expression. "I always hope they will choose to retreat, but I am prepared to do what I must if they do not."

And you would have killed… The rest of the question died before it could pass her lips. Lori couldn't judge him for what he was willing to do to protect her.

"The neighborhood where I grew up was fine, but it wasn't completely safe." She set the book aside and crossed her arms over her knees. "It's like what happened with that girl. I never thought I'd actually have to deal with someone who wanted to hurt me."

"And I hope that is the last time you will face such a thing."

"Me too."

They ate in silence, and Lori settled down to sleep. She curled up on her side, idly watching the fire and picking out the flames that had the straightest, sharpest edges.

A few days later, they veered off the road and turned south, into the woods. Lori had to duck several times to avoid low-hanging branches, and once barely avoided riding into a spiderweb, but Aragorn picked out an animal trail that would allow their horses to walk more easily.

"Is there a reason she lives in the middle of nowhere?" Lori asked as she pushed another branch out of the way.

"Some people prefer their solitude," Aragorn replied. He'd become less talkative and more pensive since they'd left Bree, but she hadn't gathered the courage to ask what was bothering him.

"I get that." She'd been eager to get back to the bustle of city (or at least town) life, but being in Bree had been a reminder of all the things that made her anxious about strangers. She just hoped if she was going to be living in the middle of the woods with only one other person, it would be someone at least a little friendly.

After a while, the sting of early winter air mingled with a more herbal scent that reminded her of the cabinet where she'd kept all her tea back at home. She breathed deeply, trying to discern the different scents: lavender, rosemary, and something more earthy she couldn't put her finger on.

A house became visible through the leafless trees. It was clearly built for a single person, and strings of dried herbs framed the door and window. A large plot for a garden took up most of the land in front of the house, a few plants protruding stubbornly from the earth.

The door swung open as they approached, and a woman stepped outside. Her long silver hair hung like a shawl around her shoulders, draped over a thick, faded green coat. Her eyes were striking—large and round like a cat's with a placid intelligence within.

"Strider." The woman, who Lori assumed to be Adela, regarded them as their horses drew closer. "It's been a long time since I've seen you in these parts."

"Indeed." Aragorn dismounted and reached over to help Lori off her own horse. "I am glad to see that the years have treated you well."

"Indeed," Adela echoed drily. She turned to Lori, the question clear in her gaze.

"Hello." Lori stepped forward, half-wondering if she should bow. She raised her hand halfway in an elvish greeting, then clasped her hands together. "My name is Lori. I've come to offer my services as an apprentice. Um, as a healer."

Adela's eyes flickered to Aragorn. "This is hardly an ideal time. Winters are hard enough without an extra mouth to feed."

"I can help with other things, too," Lori said quickly, determined to make a case for herself before Aragorn could intervene. "I can cook and clean and…help with whatever else needs to be done."

"Do you know how to chop wood?"

She hesitated, knowing she wouldn't be able to get away with a lie. "I'm a quick learner."

A small smile twitched on the woman's face. "And what do you know of the healing arts?"

"A few days ago, I was able to resuscitate a girl who had fallen into a stream. I think she might have had a seizure beforehand, but I'm not sure." She paused, her heartbeat stumbling in her chest. "I also know a little about caring for wounds. How to clean and bandage them."

She didn't dare turn to see Aragorn's reaction to her words. She'd never told him that last part before—it wasn't a skill she could be proud of.

"All right. You'll have to earn your keep, and we'll see if you learn as quickly as you say." Adela turned back to her cottage and opened the door, gesturing for Lori to follow.

A smile spread on her face, and Lori finally turned to look at Aragorn.

"That was well done," he said. "It seems you have more to offer than I thought."

She opened her mouth, searching for a sufficient excuse or apology, but he only squeezed her shoulder.

"I hope you will find happiness here, Lori. I have no doubt Adela will find you to be a good student."

Gratitude swelled in her chest, and as she stepped forward to embrace him, she recognized this parting for what it truly was. Aragorn would have no reason to come back here, not unless he was injured, and she couldn't hope for that. She had no idea when or if she would ever see him again.

"Stay safe out there," she said as she pulled back, fighting to keep her voice steady.

"You as well."

Lori took her pack from the horse's saddle, and Aragorn took the reins of her horse once he'd mounted his own. Something like panic slid through her chest like sand in an hourglass. She wanted to say something more, something that would convey how much he meant to her, but the words wouldn't come.

She could only wave goodbye as he rode through the bare trees, back towards the road.

Then she turned and walked alone into the cottage.

Adela put her to work right away, directing her to a small hollow draped in thick fabric where firewood was kept. There was a small hatchet tucked beside the pile of wood, the head of it a dull, pockmarked gray. Lori tested the edge against her palm.

"I have a whetstone if it needs to be sharpened," Adela said.

Lori had no idea if that was the case or not. She wished she'd paid more attention the couple of times she'd seen Aragorn sharpening his sword.

"Um, I'll let you know. Thank you."

The rest of the afternoon was spent hacking her way through a few segments of a tree trunk that had been felled previously. Before long, her shoulders ached and her skin was damp with sweat. She reminded herself that she was young, and probably better suited to the task than a woman of Adela's age.

The sun had nearly set by the time she dragged her feet back to the cottage, the hatchet and the fruits of her labor stored beneath the fabric and a couple pieces of wood tucked beneath her arm.

"I brought some in case you needed it for a fire," Lori said as she shouldered the door open.

It was dim inside, but Adela's eyes shone in the near-darkness, and Lori thought she saw a glint of approval.

"Light a fire, then."

Lori knelt by the fireplace and began arranging the wood. There was a small pile of kindling beside the hearth, and she grabbed a handful.

"Build a house and the fire lives; a tomb and it dies," she muttered to herself, then reached for her pack so she could retrieve her tinderbox.

Light bloomed in the fireplace, and warmth began to permeate the room. The cottage wasn't quite as cramped as she'd thought. The back wall was dominated by a worktable crowded with various herbs and instruments and a shelf stuffed with jars and bottles. Beneath the window was a small bed with a threadbare quilt over it. In the corner furthest from the door was a curtain concealing a small section of the room. Lori wondered if it was a bathroom area or something.

Adela prepared some stewed vegetables for dinner, and they ate in silence. Afterwards, Lori sat by the fire, her hands in her lap. The skin on her palms was raw from handling the hatchet, and she rubbed her fingers over the reddened skin. The marks gave her a small measure of satisfaction, more than the ache in her muscles.

After a while, the silence became uncomfortable, and she raised her head. "Have you ever had an apprentice before?"

"Not in several years." Adela clasped her hands, her knuckles knotting together. "You don't resemble him. Strider."

"Um, we're not related." Lori paused, choosing her next words carefully. "I was alone when I came here, and he offered to help me find work."

"You came from where?"

"The Vale of the Anduin." She was grateful Aragorn had given her an answer beforehand. She wasn't sure if she would have been able to come up with something on the spot.

"A long way to travel for an apprenticeship."

Lori rubbed at her palms again. "More than anything, I'm looking for a fresh start here." She forced herself to meet Adela's eyes. "I'll work as hard as I can, and I hope I can learn as much as possible in the process. That's all I want."

Adela regarded her with an inscrutable gaze, then said, "We'll start in the morning."

That first night, and every night after, Lori slept on the floor, curled up on her bedroll next to the fireplace. In the morning, she would stow it away beneath her pack and set to work for the day. In addition to chopping wood for fire, Adela had her sweep the floors and prepare meals in a small cauldron over the fire.

When it snowed, she gathered handfuls to be boiled for drinking and meals. Adela showed her how to cut sturdy white cloth into strips and boil it to sterilize the fabric. Once they dried, the strips were rolled up to be used as bandages.

There were cabbages and leeks in the garden that needed to be harvested for meals, and even with a few herbs as seasoning Lori found herself missing chili oil and other, stronger spices. There were also traps in the woods out back to catch small animals, and Lori took over checking them and preparing whatever was caught inside. After killing her first rabbit, she sat on the frozen leaves and cried.

She never found out what was in behind the curtain in the corner of the room.

The work wasn't pleasant, but it was enough to keep her busy. The moments she really looked forward to were the lessons on healing. The day after she arrived, Adela gave her a small tour of the dried herbs on her shelf of bottles, though she made sure to point out that the plants looked different growing from the ground.

"Coriander." Adela held up a jar of finely ground green leaves. "Used to lower fever." She displayed another container of tiny brown flowers bunched together. "Hemlock can be used to ease pain."

Lori tilted her head, the name conjuring a scrap of memory from the back of her mind. "Isn't hemlock poisonous?"

"In too large of a dose. Small amounts can—" Adela paused and glanced at her. "What are you doing?"

Lori looked up from her book, one hand clutching half of a graphite stick. "Taking notes…?"

"For what purpose?"

"It helps me when I go back to study things," she said, wondering if she'd done something wrong. "Don't you have a book for reference?"

"Everything I've ever learned is kept here." Adela reached up and tapped her temple. After a moment, she added, "Write your notes if you must."

Face burning, Lori went back to her book.

Her first patient came in the middle of a freezing night. Lori was huddled on her bedroll next to the embers of the fire, hands tucked in her armpits to keep them warm. She'd grown used to sleeping in the cold, but the distant howling of wolves had startled her awake. She thought of Aragorn, of his unshakeable calm in the face of danger, and counted through her breathing until she'd relaxed again.

Footsteps on the cold, hard-packed earth jolted her into awareness again, and she sat up. Her thoughts immediately went to the bandits, and she cast about for something she could use to defend herself.

A voice, harsh with panicked breaths, came from outside: "Help."

Lori pushed herself to her feet and opened the door a crack, wincing as a freezing air swept inside. In the light of the moon, she could see a man standing in the middle of the garden, his arm cradled against his chest. The iron-tang of blood reached her nose.

The man lifted his gaze to her face, his thin lips quivering. "I need help. I-I'm hurt. I heard there was a cunning woman 'round these parts, and I—"

Lori turned to wake Adela, but the woman was already on her feet.

"Let him in."

Bracing herself against the cold, Lori opened the door and beckoned the man inside.

"Fire. And fresh water." Adela moved towards her worktable, glancing over her shoulder as the man stumbled inside. "What happened to you?"

"A wolf got me." Even in the dim cottage, the man's face was so pale it nearly shone.

Lori ushered him towards the chair, which had been set beside the bed. She kicked her bedroll aside and knelt down to make a fire, her movements sharp and quick with adrenaline. Once she had a small flame going, she grabbed a candle nestled in a tin dish from the shelf, lit it, and carried it to the man's side.

Adela was unwrapping a cloth, which appeared to be the torn remains of a woolen cap, from the man's arm. Whatever color the fabric had once been, it was dark red now. Lori hissed through her teeth as the torn flesh beneath was revealed. There was too much blood smeared across his skin to see the full extent of the injury, but there was enough of it for her to know that it was deep.

Lori snatched her book from her pack and laid it on the bed, then placed the candle on the flat surface so it wouldn't tip over and light the whole house on fire. With her hands free, she darted over to the shelf and grabbed a handful of clean rags and a roll of bandages. She handed a rag to Adela, who folded it twice with a deft movement and pressed it to the wound on the inside of the man's forearm, which was leaking blood onto his trousers. Lori made another trip to the shelf to grab a clay jug of water, and stood at the man's other side.

"We'll need to stop the bleeding before we go about cleaning the wound," Adela said, the even cadence of her voice in sharp contrast to the urgency pounding through Lori's veins.

The man hadn't taken his eyes off his arm once, his gaze growing increasingly hollow as he stared at the red stain blooming on the rag.

"Hey." Lori touched him gently on the shoulder. "What's your name?"

He blinked, then uttered through trembling lips, "Tobias."

"It's nice to meet you. I'm Lori, and this is Adela." She paused, racking her brain for an easy topic that would help distract him. "Where are you from?"

A frown twitched on his face. "Staddle."

"What's it like there?"

"It's on the other side of the hill from Bree. We've a windmill."

"That sounds nice. Did you ever visit Bree?"

Tobias nodded, sweat glistening on his upper lip. "On market days. Sometimes I'd take shifts in the quarry."

"That sounds like hard work. Did you ever find anything interesting?"

She distracted him with gentle questions until Adela motioned for the jug of water. Lori watched as she wet another rag and began to clean the blood from the wound. Tobias hissed through his teeth more than once, but he managed to keep his arm steady as she worked.

"Sutures," Adela said, and Lori returned to the shelf. She sterilized the small, curved needle in the fire, then brought the tools to the old woman. She held the candle close and studied each movement of the needle as Adela stitched shut the two most severe wounds. The rest of Tobias's arm was wrapped tightly in clean bandages, and the man sat back with a shaky sigh.

"How do you feel?" Lori asked, carefully placing the candle back on the book.

"My arm still hurts something awful, but I'd be worse off if you two hadn't helped." He lifted his gaze to Adela. "I owe you a great debt, miss."

Adela dipped her head in acknowledgement. "There's still a chance your wound could be infected. We'll know for sure in a couple days."

Tobias hesitated. "I'd rather be back on the road as soon as I can. Perhaps there's some medicine I could take with me? I-If there truly is an infection?"

"Treating an infection will take more than medicine. And you won't make it far if a fever takes you."

"You should at least rest a little," Lori said with a small, reassuring smile. "Infected or not, your wound needs to heal."

He dropped his gaze to the floor. "All right, then."

Adela gestured for him to use the bed, but Tobias adamantly refused, instead slumping in the chair with his bandaged arm cradled against his chest. Lori felt a twinge of sympathy, remembering her own days of traveling with an injured arm. She curled up on her bedroll, waiting for the last of the adrenaline to fade before she fell asleep.

In the morning, the chair was empty.

Lori made a circuit around the cottage, searching the barren trees, but there was no sign of Tobias. The ground was too cold to yield to any footprints. She might have thought the events of last night to be a dream, if it weren't for the bloodied rags lying next to the water jug.

"Why would he leave?" Lori asked when she returned. "He'll be risking his life out there."

"Whatever he is fleeing from, he fears it more than the wolves or an infection," Adela replied.

"Should we be afraid too?" Lori asked hesitantly. Adela could give Aragorn a run for his money when it came to vague answers.

"If you begin entertaining fears in a place like this, you will see them in every shadow and sudden movement." She pointed to the bloody rags. "Soak those now. If there are wolves nearby, the scent might attract them."

Lori tried to hide her irritation as she trudged outside to gather water. It wasn't like she could simply stop being afraid. With Aragorn, she'd been assured that he would protect her if something happened, but Adela didn't seem to have anything to back up her lack of concern.

She plunged the rags into the freezing water, hissing as the cold bit into her fingers. Maybe she should have asked Aragorn to give her lessons in self defense.

Two days later, just as the sun was setting, they received a knock on the door.

Lori opened it to find a tall stranger on the other side. Before he could speak, she had already read his identity in the worn clothing and the sword at his hip: Ranger.

His dark beard was ragged, his eyes tired, but she didn't miss the quick, sweeping glance he gave the interior of the cottage. "I'm in search of a man by the name of Tobias. He was seen fleeing south. He's tall, with dark hair."

Lori's heart skipped a beat. She glanced back at Adela, who had stood up from her work table.

"You're the first visitor we've had in two weeks," the woman said, her eyes calm and guileless.

Hoping she could keep a similar composure, Lori turned back to the Ranger.

"He is wanted for murder," he said.

"As you can see, we still live," Adela replied evenly. "I wish you safe travels during your search."

Lori managed a nod. The Ranger dipped his head in thanks and stepped away from the door. In a handful of long strides, he reached the edge of the forest and slipped away through the trees.

She closed the door, her heartbeat rising to a forceful pace, and turned around. "Why didn't you tell him the truth?"

"I am in the business of providing medicine and treatments. Neither of those include information on the whereabouts of others." Adela had sat back down and resumed her work.

"We slept under the same roof as a murderer."

"Yet he did us no harm." Adela looked up, her gaze as calm as ever. "People do not poison the well they drink from, nor do they maim the hand that may one day save their life."

Aragorn had mentioned something similar before, that no one would be interested in killing a healer that was willing to tend to their wounds. Lori turned towards the vacant chair and wrapped her arms around herself. For all she knew, Tobias could be dead at this point. Or he could be alive and capable of killing again.

She turned back to Adela. "So you've never once been afraid that someone was going to hurt you here?"

"You remember what I told you." It was a statement, not a question.

Lori had mulled over her words about fear during the past couple of days, and she understood the reasoning. Fear could lead to paranoia, and that could get in the way of helping innocent people. But in Adela's case, it didn't seem as though she'd made the decision not to be afraid of getting injured or killed.

It seemed as though she simply didn't care.

That night, after Adela had fallen asleep, Lori sat in the chair with the paring knife they used for cutting herbs in one hand. She'd wrestled with the thought of using it before. But this was the first time she wondered if she'd be forced to use it against someone else.

I don't anticipate Lori staying with Adela for more than a couple chapter after this. There's another segment to the plot, a sort of act two that I'm eager to get to, and I'll hopefully be introducing some more canon characters soon. (If you've read my other LOTR fics you might know where this is going lol)

In other news, next month I'll be moving into my own place (!) and starting a new job, so updates will probably be slow once I start working. Thanks so much to everyone who has reviewed/favorited/followed so far.