AN: Hey! Sorry it took so long for me to update; like I said I was really busy the last few days. Anyway, here's chapter 6!
After eating breakfast and checking around for any last things they might need, Elena and Eldarion started off towards Bree. Elena's arm was feeling much better, and it was healing quite nicely. Just in case though, they brought a good supply of bandages and herbs so if it was still infected or opened up again they wouldn't be at a loss for supplies.
The journey started out mostly in silence, but there was an occasional comment from either one of them about various things. When they stopped for lunch, which happened to be relatively close to where they first met, a real conversation finally started.
"So, tell me more about where you come from." Eldarion started. "I am very curious about where exactly it is, and what sort of country it is."
This immediately made Elena nervous and she couldn't answer for a few moments because she had no idea what to say. She recovered quickly enough to answer though before the silence seemed unusual.
"Well, like I said, it is very far in the West. To get there, one must travel across the sea for a few weeks, and then travel across a huge continent until you have nearly arrived at the other end of it. That land journey would take months on horseback, and even longer walking. Finally, you would arrive at my homeland. It looks relatively similar to this place, with lots of trees and mountains, but there are much more people and not nearly as much wilderness. We do very different things there, such as how we work and how we travel. It is extremely complicated, but some basic examples are that we have wagons that don't need horses or oxen to be pulled, ways to communicate over far distances other than a messenger, and other things you wouldn't even be able to imagine."
That is basically how they spent the rest of the day; with Elena talking about her world and Eldarion listening with extreme interest. He was especially interested in airplanes, which was particularly difficult for Elena to explain, but even with the little explanation she could give Eldarion was fascinated by the idea of people flying. One of the main things he really didn't understand though was that the only intelligent race was humans. It was extremely hard for him to imagine elves, dwarves, hobbits, orcs, and all other creatures that were in his world equal if not more intelligent than humans didn't exist and never did where Elena came from.
"Wait, if there aren't any elves, dwarves, wargs, or anything else like that in your country, how did you know it was a warg that attacked you?"
Elena knew that explaining how her world was would eventually backfire on her, and knew she was on dangerous ground now.
"Well, the creatures don't exist, but we do have stories about them. Most people just think they were made up though, not that they are actual creatures in a different world."
"What about your sword? It looks just like the elvish one that Frodo is holding in a painting of the Fellowship of the Ring in Minas Terith, but if you don't have elves in your country how could you have an elvish sword?"
Why must he be so curious about these kinds of things? "Um, one of the stories we have explains what elvish swords look like, and some people copied the design for anyone who liked the elvish style. They aren't as good as a real elvish sword though, because it isn't as sturdy and it doesn't glow blue when orcs are around." It was the best explanation she could come up with without revealing the fact that there were tons of books and movies and websites and collectables all devoted to the story of Middle Earth.
"Oh, that explains why it isn't glowing now." He whispered while putting his finger to his lips and gesturing over his shoulder. Elena immediately got the meaning and slowly pulled Sting over to her side and got ready to pull it out of its sheath at Eldarion's signal. Suddenly he whipped out his own sword and spun around towards the quiet rustling Elena had just started hearing on the other side of the path. As he shot towards the noise she quickly unsheathed Sting, then jumped behind a tree in case whoever was spying on them had a bow. Hearing some scuffling in the brush that grew along the side of the road, she slowly peeked out from behind the wide trunk of the tree. Eldarion was wrestling to hold down a small orc, but when it pulled out a knife and was about to stab the prince, he had no choice but to kill it.
"It looks like a scout. It is poorly armed and seems to be alone, so it was probably sent from the mountains to spy on the people here. I noticed it following me a while back, but I didn't want to let on we knew it was there until I was sure it was an enemy. This is just another sign that we need to hurry to Bree and the Shire so we can warn them before it is too late. Killing this spy will slow the orcs down a bit, but it definitely won't do anything to stop them. We'd better go a bit further before stopping for the night, and try to get to Bree by tomorrow night. It is a pretty long way, but if we can make it to the Hoarwell River by tonight we should be able to make it."
They pressed on to the river and arrived there just after nightfall. The next day they had little conversation in their rush to get to Bree by that night.
After a long day of hard walking without even a break for lunch (they ate while walking), they finally arrived in Bree a couple hours after nightfall. They were welcomed into the Prancing Pony inn, which was as busy as ever even with the new caretaker. After a much appreciated meal of some fresh ham, cheese, bread, and ale (or tea in Elena's case), they settled in their rooms for a much needed rest.
AN: Well, that took a while to write. This chapter was mainly a filler so I wouldn't have to skip over their journey from Rivendell to Bree, although I did skip half of it. Sorry if it seems really dull and boring; it certainly seemed that way to me. That's why I tried to add a bit of excitement with the orc, but I don't think I did a very good job. Give me some feedback on what you think of this chapter compared to the previous ones. Anyway, until next time!