[piosenniel]

She motioned for him to pull his chair closer as she laid out a map on the bed. 'Look, here are the ports of Andunië and Eldalondë. We know that in 3319 of the Second Age, Ar-Pharazôn will launch his great offensive from these two. We also know the voyage to Eressëa and the encampment at Túna will take 39 days.'

Taking a well-worn pencil, she sketched in the route the Telerin would follow, once they were called, heading in a southeasterly direction from the Shadowy Seas, then north to the waters well off the southern coast of the Isle. 'According to Idril, it will take them twenty days to reach this position.'

'A question.' said Mithadan. 'Do you know the specific date the King will launch his navy?'

'That's one of my problems - no, I don't. I was hoping somewhere in your studies you might have come across a reference to this. Will you look for it? Barring finding the answer so easily, can we contact someone in Númenor to get the date from them? I haven't come up with someone with whom we might do this safely, though.' She rapped the pencil on the map. 'Or what about this idea. We send Bird in her bird form to spy out the departure date for us.'

'Moving beyond that problem, I'd like to call the Telerin ships about two days after the fleet has left. That will give them plenty of time to arrive, and us plenty of time to get away from the Isle before the world is broken. It will also give Levanto time to contact the imprisoned hobbits and let them know we are coming for them. He can also glean information from them about how heavily they are guarded. I also need to speak with Ancalimon about the turn of events that has happened on this ship, and I think he will want to speak with Child concerning the hobbits.'

'What can you add to this? What concerns should we be looking at more closely?'

[ September 09, 2002: Message edited by: piosenniel ]