[The X Phial]

It was evening in the Chambria household. Bregand couldn't recall ever seeing such lush surroundings. Evendim City, his home, was beautiful in his mind, and silently he had been pleased that along the journey he had yet to see something better. Minas Tirith, however, made his city look like a backwater dive. The Chambria mansion in particular seemed decadent beyond his imaginings. When the party had arrived he had found a servant and asked how to make an appointment with the Captain of the King's guard. He still had a message to deliver. To his surprise, the servant simply asked his name and what time he wanted an appointment and had run off the make the arrangements for him. Two hours later, as he was washing for dinner, the servant told him the Captain would meet with him in the morning.

Bregand pulled his messenger's uniform from his pack and decided that after dinner he would try to take some wrinkles out. The servant who had come to fetch him, however, said it would just be easier for the staff to take care of it.

"Guests make more trouble when they try not to bother the servants," he was assured.

Bregand entered a formal dining room to find most of the male members of the company there already. Like himself, they had all been provided with "suitable dinner wear" by their hosts. Calimir and Turthol wore their finery well, but Rangar seemed very uncomfortable and Tareth looked as though he wanted to disappear into the wall.

Bregand walked over the the blacksmith. Tareth fidgeted uncomfortably, aware that they had unfinished business between them.

"Tareth," the boy began. "I want to apologise for how I have been acting. I think everyone now knows how I feel about Carmalita. Indeed, some seemed to know even before I did." He paused to take a long breath.

"I guess the problem is, I don't know how she feels about me. When I see her talking and laughing with you, I...I just...I don't know."

He hung his head, blushing. Tareth made a sound in his throat.

"Bregand, I'm no matchmaker, and I'm not wise in the ways of women. I've known Carmalita a long time, though, and I've rarely seen her his happy. Now, I could be wrong, but I think it's more than the trip that's been makin' her smile."

With that the blacksmith turned away. Bregand was confused. He wanted to believe that the nurse could return his feelings, but he also wanted that belief to be founded in reality and not some boyhood fantasy. He realised he hadn't had the chance to speak to her about her abandonment by the Ilithien. In truth he did not know what to say, but he sensed his silence was worse than anything he could squeak out. He resolved to speak to her about it as soon as he had delivered his message.

At that moment the doors opened and the ladies entered en masse, sans Wren. Enien shone with an otherwordly beauty, but Bregand had eyes only for Carmalita. She wore a crimson dress, obviously borrowed for the occasion, and wore no other ornament but her red ribbon, which she had fastened about her throat for the evening.

Bregand didn't notice the other company members as they chuckled to themselves over his reaction. All thoughts of delaying his apology left his mind and he was making his way to her side when the large doors at the head of the room opened and the hosts arrived. Dinner was served. Before he knew it he was swept to the table by a servant. Carmalita was seated across from him, not a position in which they could speak privately. Wren's father made a toast, the food was served, and the meal began. He heard Wren and Turthol speaking with Wren's father about some ship or other, and managed to remember to eat a decent bit of food, but the dinner was an interminable torture appeased only by the fact that Carmalita occasionally caught his eye and smiled uncertainly.