[Envinyatar]

Fen Sheperdspurse

The Elves and those nosey rangers had left the common room, the man from Rohan following behind. Gone down the hall to one of the fancy rooms. Fen watched them as they left, and waited patiently for a few moments to see that none would return. With the ease of one used to oozing quietly from one place to another, he slid up to the bar, landing close to the hallway the companions had gone down. Fen nodded casually to the man standing next to him, offering to stand him a drink. He’d jostled the man as he’d leaned in against the bar, and he wanted no trouble. Fen was waiting for old Butterbur’s son to have his attention occupied, then he intended to sneak down the hallway to hear what he might.

A trio of Bree men near him caught his interest with their loud talk. He sidled a little closer, leaned in on the bar, and cocked his ear toward the group. The din in the room rose and fell, allowing him only snatches of the conversation.

“ ‘Em eastsiders are losing cattle and sheep faster than Butterbur can finish a bowl of cream soup!”

Fen hid a smirk at this declaration, nodding his head slightly at the truth of it..

“We know of the missing life stock Lenny . . .” his companion remarked in an impatient tone.

“Yeah, but jah haf no idea the scale of it! We’re talking about entire enclosures, tens of hundreds, of thousands of them! All missing, guard dogs slaughtered in the most gruesome manner, farmers with missing heads. Barns and houses flattened! Makes yer sick in the stomach!”

‘You’ve no idea how sick it would make you if you knew the whole story,’ thought Fen, relishing the fact that he was lucky enough to be ‘in’ on it.

An argument broke out at a table by the fireplace, causing Fen to miss the next few patches of conversation at the bar. By the time things had quieted, Prand was speaking again.

“This, this missing life stock thing, it’s just a recent development. You saw those rangers? And those newcomers that joined them? I bet Gondor sent them here to deal with it. The king cares. He was after all, one of us.”

Fen spluttered into his mug as he tried to take a drink. He hadn’t made the connection himself . . . and now here was this other fellow making it for him. The Rangers and Elves weren’t just passing through. They were here to nose around in his boss’ business. Well, that wouldn’t do! Fen had plans for retiring to his own comfy little place once he collected enough coin to see himself comfortable. The Boss would need to hear about this development.

The Innkeeper had gone over to see to the argument at the fireplace. Fen slipped away from the bar and down the lamplit hallway. He doused the lights as he went, drawing near to the room where his quarry was gathered. The door was shut, locked in fact – he’d tried the latch ever so slightly and met resistance. Something scraped near the door and he leapt for the darkness of an open, empty room . . .