Journal #15 - Delays and Detours

The way south is troublesome. The road we have been roughly following (even if we cannot walk it, it served as a guide to us while we rode hidden) lead into a pass through a rocky vale. We have no choice but to either brave the road or find a way around the range. It seems to be sprouting out westwards from the mountains, but if the map is to be trusted, it should not be too wide. I do not wish to risk the road. It is most certainly watched, and a good place for an ambush, too.
But it means a detour, and we are already delayed.

I also fear we have been depending on our provisions too much and not hunted our meals as we should have. We tire ourselves out travelling until late in the evenings and we were often too tired to hunt. It is my fault, for I have often encouraged this. I must remember my duties to this endeavour and not give in to fatigue. We may yet need this Elvish waybread, when the road becomes more dangerous.
But it is spring now, and food should be easier to find. That at least is a relief.

But those are worries we will have to face when they come to us, tomorrow or the day after. We cannot do much about them save that.
Andswaru is sleeping on his bedroll beside the fire, and I know the journey tasks him as much as it tasks me. We both have our worries besides the strains the road puts upon us - for he too returns home with ill news. I wish I could lighten his burden somehow. I know that neither of us will have an easy way home, when we are in the Mark, and we both will have to walk it alone.
And I have no answer to his question that would lighten his heart. I fear I may have... nay, this is something for the future, and the safety of the Mark. Things will look different then.

And then, after this hard road home... I shall need to prepare, and return. I have sworn it to Father and to myself.
Right now, it seems so absurd a task to me that I cannot even imagine it possible. I was full of grief and anger when I made that vow, but since then I have tasted more of life on the road than I wished, with half the road still to go. I used to pride myself on being able to survive for as long as I wished out in the horsefields - how wrong I was to assume that I was truly out in the wild, with no-one to return to, then! How different walking the wilderness, in enemy territory, is to that. To say nothing of fighting -
The reality is that I don't know if I can do it. Alone, or with friends, if they will come, I wonder if I will not be a burden to those involved. Andswaru does not say it, but I see in his eyes that he would rather wish to take this upon himself and go alone. And what about Mother? Will she let me go? "A woman's place is not in the fields, Vaarion," she used to say to me.
I know this is not the time to decide it, but my mind keeps returning to this while we ride.
I don't want to give up, and I don't know what to do. I am torn.
 

[a rubbing of a pendant is made on the thin paper of the journal page]