Chapter 7

Bree. Bree! What a cheerful-sounding name. Hell of a place, though—only one decent inn, and it's filled with farmers as dull as the land they worked. Most of the inhabitants of the place are Men, naturally, because Elves like to skulk around in the forests and Dwarves prefer the elegance and comfort of our mountain halls.

But I was feeling pretty cheerful when we arrived in Bree. Mission accomplished and nobody lost or seriously damaged. All I had to do was to hand the gold over to Aunt Nott. Then I could go home and catch up on my drinking.

We went to The Prancing Pony, the single decent inn I was talking about. Aunt Nott had already arrived, complete with her usual retinue of servants and guards and outriders. I turned the cart with the gold over to Nandi, Aunt Nott's chief assistant, and let him know that there would be dwarves to pay for services rendered. He nodded and said he'd take care of them.

Then I tried to explain about Var. Nandi looked confused. Introductions seemed to be in order but when I looked around for her, she had vanished. Worse, my stomach was empty and rumbling. Food first, I decided, and then I'd track her down and get her sorted.

In the taproom of the inn, my traveling companions were already enjoying a hearty meal. Butterbur the innkeeper serves decent food. Before I could join them, however, I heard a familiar deep voice calling my name.

"Dwalin." My cousin, Thorin Oakenshield, smiled as he embraced me. We head-butted, warrior-fashion, and pounded each other heartily on the back. You have to be in good shape to endure a dwarven welcome, and of course we both were.

"Thorin," I replied. "What are you drinking? Let me buy you another." This was to let him know how delighted I was to see him again. I was also glad to see him in such good spirits. Thorin was a gloomy cuss, frustrated and angry about things that seemed impossible to change. He'd never gotten over the loss of Erebor—the burden of kingship, I guess. But he was a good dwarf, a rock-solid leader and the best of friends. I would trust him with my life. Anything he wanted of me, I'd give him without question or hesitation. Anything.

The ladies loved Thorin, and not just dwarven women. Even the human women sighed and fluttered their eyelashes at him. I'm not kidding—two of the barmaids at the Pony brought us our mugs of ale. One mug they deposited on the table somewhere near me. The other they tenderly placed at Thorin's side. Then they fussed for a bit, wiping down the table so that he wouldn't get any spilled ale on his coat sleeves. He smiled at them in thanks and they practically fainted on the spot.

I could have told them that it wouldn't do any good. Once, long ago, Thorin had been a happy young prince—handsome, wealthy, and engaged to a beautiful girl—but then the dragon had come and everything had changed. Now, Thorin was too tied up in knots inside to even notice all this female attention.

I'd said as much to a dwarven woman I knew, and she had sighed. "Well, of course he doesn't notice them. But I could help him, if only he'd let me!"

Once the barmaids had retreated, Thorin told me that he'd come to Bree to negotiate some deal or other having to do with the sale of plowshares. He started looking gloomy, so to cheer him up, I told him what I'd been doing. During my tale, the other dwarves drifted over to the table and I introduced them all. They were suitably impressed to meet a real Heir of Durin (although technically I'm one, too. It's just lucky for everyone that there's no danger of me ever ascending the throne). Soon Thorin was giving them all a piece of his kingly mind. He's a powerful speaker and they were his, body and soul, long before he'd finished talking.

Then a tall, scruffy-looking fellow in gray robes stalked into the inn. He leaned on a wooden staff, and in one hand he held a blue hat that came to a sharp point on top. His cold blue eyes surveyed the taproom.

When Thorin caught sight of him, he stood up and moved toward him. "Master Gandalf, I know you only by sight, but now I should be glad to speak with you. For you have often come into my thoughts of late, as if I were bidden to seek you. Indeed I should have done so, if I had known where to find you."

Gandalf looked at him with wonder. "That is strange, Thorin Oakenshield," he said. "For I have thought of you also; and though I am on my way to the Shire, it was in my mind that is the way also to your halls."

So Thorin and this Gandalf went to talk things over at another table, and the rest of us were left to eat and drink on our own. The ale flowed freely, and the atmosphere had gotten pretty lively by the time I finished my dinner.

Nandi came over and told me that Aunt Nott required my presence. I warned the dwarves not to break anything they couldn't replace, and followed him up the stairs. He went into her room, after motioning to me to wait outside.

The two maids who had fluttered around Thorin came giggling down the hall, but they stopped when they saw me. They curtsied.

"Good evening, sir," said the one with brown curly hair. She looked at the door of the room Aunt Nott was staying in, and then back at me. "Are you here with Lord Nott?"

I raised one eyebrow. "Lord Nott?"

Aunt Nott was a great-grandmother, stocky and gruff and round as a barrel, but she was still a woman. Anybody with an ounce of sense could see that she wasn't a man. Could it be that the people here couldn't tell the difference? And had Aunt Nott allowed the mistake to stand, for some reason of her own? She was a crafty old devil, and I wouldn't have put it past her.

"He comes here often," she said, studying me. "He's a very wealthy dwarf."

"So is the younger one," said her companion, whose hair was the color of polished copper. She sighed. "He's so good-looking, too."

Another conquest for Thorin, apparently.

"I love that blonde hair," the redhead added with a giggle.

Curly-Head patted my arm, and the door to the room opened as she said, "Not me. Are you busy later on, sir dwarf?"

"Um, yes. Busy," I muttered and walked past her into the room. My ears were burning. Mahal, what was that girl thinking? She wasn't even a dwarf.

"Tell the blonde one I'd be happy to serve him," the redhead called after me.

Nandi smirked as he closed the door behind me, and I glared at him. This was ridiculous.

At the other end of the room, sitting behind a table that was apparently serving her as a desk, sat Aunt Nott. She scowled at me, looking for all the world like a big frog with her wide, disapproving mouth and small black eyes. She was wearing a green robe trimmed with silver bullion embroidered in diamond shapes along the collar and front. Her beard was almost as silver as the embroidery on her clothing.

The beards of dwarf women are nothing like what men grow. They're downy and soft, and very short. The most noticeable hair on younger women is along the temples, which grows down the sides of a woman's face in front of her ears, like sideburns. Then there is light, wispy hair along the jawline under the chin, barely noticeable save on the darkest-haired of women. Totally different from how a man's hair grows.

However, the older a woman gets, the more you can see her beard. Aunt Nott had white hairs actually bracketing her mouth and chin, as well as the hair along the sides of her face. She still looked like a woman to me, but I could kind of see how she might look different to a human, whose women had no hair at all on their faces.

"I certainly hope you're not planning to commit any foolishness with Butterbur's barmaids," Aunt Nott said. "So far it appears you've done well with this operation. Don't ruin it now."

"No! That is, thanks for the compliments, but no. Not my style," I said. My ears felt hotter and the warmth started trickling down my neck. I looked around the room. Nandi had settled in a chair, and one of Aunt Nott's female attendants sat behind her in a shadowy corner of the room. I relaxed enough to chuckle. "I think they like Thorin better. And whoever your blonde dwarf might be. Did Fili come with you?"

"No." Aunt Nott tapped the table top. "Give me your report."

I sat down and told her the whole story, from hiring the dwarves in Dunland, to discovering Var imprisoned in the cart, to adding the caravan dwarves and then bringing Dori into our group. Then I described the attack by bandits in the South Downs, and how the bandits ignored the gold to go for Var. Aunt Nott nodded thoughtfully.

Summing it all up, I said, "So what we don't know is, who is Var? How did she get mixed up with your gold in the first place, and who's after her? Also, where is she now? I haven't seen her since we arrived at the inn."

Aunt Nott nodded some more. Finally she said, "Very well. Thanks, Dwalin. You may go."

I stood up through force of habit, then stopped. "But you haven't answered my questions."

"You don't need to worry about it. I'll take it from here," she said calmly.

"But I just told you that her life is being threatened. Damn it, I said I'd protect her, and we don't even know where she is."

Aunt Nott gave me a long, considering look, then nodded again. "I know where she is. Since you seem eager to do so, then you shall protect her as we all travel back to the Blue Mountains."

A chill went up my spine. "Wait. What? No, I'm done with this. I just wanted to know if she was safe."

"She is safe. For the moment," said Aunt Nott. She motioned to her lady attendant, who stood up and came forward.

She moved into the light, an elegant dwarven beauty with her golden hair piled up in loops and ringlets dotted with dangling pearls. Her elaborate dress was of crimson satin, laced tightly with gold cords that defined and enhanced her womanly figure. Over the dress she wore a dark red robe of heavy velvet. She was gorgeous—powerfully, overwhelmingly magnificent. My mouth hung open, and maybe I drooled a little.

"Var?" I whispered. Then I cleared my throat. "Oh, so there you are."

She smiled at me, and my heart nearly stopped. I didn't think I could take too much more of her piercing beauty. It would turn me into a gibbering idiot. Assuming, of course, I wasn't already an idiot. My brains felt like they were going soft.

Aunt Nott said, "Well, Var, you were right. It sounds like he made you a promise. I'll let you have him until we get back to the Blue Mountains. But after that, he is mine again."

I panicked. "Look, I'm standing right here! You can't just hand me off to her like a spare pack mule."

Var planted her hands on her hips and glared at me. "Didn't you say you'd protect me? Didn't you?"

And just like that, she was her normal self again, bossy and difficult and very, very pretty. I was infinitely relieved.

"Okay, all right. I guess I did." I waved a forefinger in Var's face. "But you better answer my questions."

"Come with me, and I'll explain." Var said.