[Mithalwen]

Mithalwen's swift long steps soon brought her back to the inn. Her hours at the forge had been well spent and her tasks had been accomplished. Now it was time to go. She wondered whether she would b e able to slip away without fuss. She shrank from another encounter with Uien after her strange behaviour and she did not wish to tarry to hear Hearpwine laud his own prowess as a musician. Her decision had been made during the afternoon. She would not continue her journey immediately but go home ot the havens. Some instinct called her and besides there was another reason.... a possibility she had not made up her mind about, something that Toby Flaxman the had suggested, but it would do no harm to delay her journey to Rivendell a little.

She slipped round the back of the building to the stables and the paddock where her grey horse Aeglos grazed she summoned him with her mind. He was dusty and grass stained but Meriadoc the stableman appeared and offered to groom him. and so Mithalwen passed in to the shadows of the common room for what she expected to be the last time. Getting paper & pen and ink from her luggage and scraping together enough pennies for a tankard of cider, she found a private corner and started to write.