[Nurumaiel]

Marigold blushed a little at Miz Bella's words, sensing that she had made some sort of mistake... though it seemed quite logical to arrange the books by how big they were. She said nothing, however, deciding that it wouldn't do any use. She had made some sort of mistake, and obviously Miz Bella didn't see how logical their manner of sorting really was. And that was that. She sighed, dropped her eyes to the ground, and continued her slow pace to the garden.

Haltred and Estella were already there. Estella had darted away in the manner of a frightened rabbit at the earliest opportunity, and Haltred had followed her. As Marigold approached them, having firmly decided to not leave them without friends, Estella clasped her hands shyly behind her back, dropping her head very low, and Haltred smiled in a friendly way.

Purples, pinks, reds, yellows... in fact, every colour of the rainbow surrounded them in the garden. The flowers had suffered a temporary ordeal during the hard rains, but as a result they blossomed out stronger and brighter than before. The blue sky, the yellow sun, and the fluffy white clouds that scurried here and there in a merry game of tag seemed to have bent down from their lofty heights to give colours to the wee things on the earth.

Marigold bent to pick one of her namesakes, and gazed for a moment into the rich, warm, golden glow before fastening it up in her hair. "I'm so grateful," she said, "that marigolds are rather orange, rather than yellowish. It's very hard to wear them in my hair even as it is, but they're a different enough colour that they look all right. Now, you know, my mother's hair was black, and her name was Lilac. She could wear lilacs in her hair and it looked beautiful."

She paused, and looked here and there, and smiled at a little forget-me-not, and beckoned to Estella, who advanced shyly when her brother prodded her on.

"Here, Estella," said Marigold. "These forget-me-nots will look beautiful in your hair. My papa always told them that when the sun was out and shining, a hobbit girl doesn't look proper if she doesn't have flowers in her hair. 'All the girls are little flowers,' he said. 'There are Marigolds and Lilacs and Buttercups, and they ought to look like it.'" She tucked the little forget-me-nots behind Estella's ear, and frowned a little. "I knew a girl who told a boy forget-me-nots were to give to your sweetheart when you were going away. And so that boy, because he was going to Michel Delving, gave me some forget-me-nots. I just looked at him scornfully. But I did tell him goodbye very nicely, because I don't think he wanted to go away. Forget-me-nots always remind me to think of and love my mother and father." She looked wistfully at the little flower, and then turned to Haltred with a bright smile.

"Are you enjoying school?" she asked.

"I am," he replied, and added with a rueful grin, "though I feel terribly stupid at times."

"Well, so do I," Marigold replied, with a little laugh. "I'm not very good at anything at all. I'm very glad my papa taught me a little of reading and writing. But soon we'll all know everything." She nodded her head, looking well-pleased with the prospect, and then snatched Estella's hand in a way that defied any protest. "Come on," she said. "Lunch is over there and I'm very hungry."