“Do you know where we are?” Sfeithi asked. They had walked two days along the road under armadas of thunderheads that bunched up against the distant Misty Mountains and not laid eyes upon another living soul.
The ground undulated slowly in one vast meadow that expanded toward north and south past where the opposing mountain ranges loomed like vast colliding ships. The grassy plains were carpeted with a thick verdant emerald grass and seemed to sweep endlessly on toward the east.
Rhavanielle clucked to herself absently, scanning the horizon in every direction. “We are in a place the locals call Westfold. Away to the south there lies an old castle that guards the gap. There...where the line of the mountains gets a bit shorter. Ahead down the road is Edoras, the chief town of the Calenardrim. The Rohirrim, I mean to say.”
“It is not rightly a city,” she went on, “for the folk here about do not build cities of stone but prefer to live dispersed and dwell in lone houses or clusters of houses. Sometimes they will build a palisade of timber about the whole. I have not journeyed among them, but know a little from reading and speaking to those who have come to know them a little. Including Curunir.”
“Curunir did not speak of them at our dinner,” said Gormr.
“Curunir thinks little of them. He sees them as useful for their martial skill, but for little else. They are not a people of great learning,” Rhavanielle answered thoughtfully. She felt less bad imputing ill motive to Curunir after their meeting.
She felt like sharing her misgivings, but just then her eyes caught a flicker on the southern horizon amidst the heather and tall grasses. A body of mounted soldiery. She made out glittering lanceheads and bright pennants.
“Someone's coming!” she murmured. She threw herself onto her knees and put her ear to the ground. The dwarves traded a quick glance but made no sound. They stared off toward the south, seeing nothing yet. But they knew enough about elves to trust her.
“A good number...I am not trained in such things. Or was but have not done it in far too long,” she said. For the moment, the only other sound competing with her voice was the murmur of a warm breeze from the west.
Sfeithi knelt down beside his friend. A long pause and then he spoke up clearly. “Thirty-three,” he said. “Thirty three on horseback.” Rhavanielle popped up, looked admiringly at Sfeithi and stared away again southward, brushing away dirt from her bare knees.
“You're right,” she said flatly, her voice colored with concern. “We've got about a hundred seconds to make up our minds to try to hide or stand here in plain sight before they see us if they are men. If they are elves, they've seen us already. I think that they are men, for I know all the raiment and armor used by all the elves in the west of Middle Earth."
“If they are men, they are Rohirrim. I say we wait and parlay with them,” came Gorm's voice, chiming in at last. Rhavanielle and Sfeithi's silence marked agreement and the three sat down by the side of the road to wait.
