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Old 03-02-2008, 12:56 PM   #34
littlemanpoet
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Join Date: Jan 2002
Location: The Edge of Faerie
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littlemanpoet is battling Black Riders on Weathertop.littlemanpoet is battling Black Riders on Weathertop.
Falco

Well that hadn't turned into much. Falco had an urge to assuage his disappointment by having a good smoke on his pipe, but decided that would give him away, so he just continued moving through the brush beneath the line of trees.

He came to marshland, which stretched out before him from the Scar to his left, and to right as far as he could see. What a miserable stretch of land! Behind him and to his right lay the land of the neighbor whom they did not yet know. It was well tilled and therefore seemed prosperous enough, raised a foot or so, and sloping gently up toward the center of the holding where the landholder's home and outbuildings were located.

Falco considered following the border of the neighbor's land, but decided to wait on that until another day. He turned left and discovered a low and somewhat ruined stone wall. It was built of many large stones, uncut and rough; in many places at one or more stones had fallen and lay derelict in the mud of the marsh or as loose rubble just inside the land Eodwine now called his. The stone wall stretched all the way to the Scar, and Falco followed it that far.

The Scar itself was apparently not one ridge of rough and stony hill, but three separate ridges with rough brambly valleys between each one. Not a nice place at all! Falco wondered how it had gotten there, and thought back to a talk he had had with Mayor Samwise Gardener, who had explained to him that Mister Frodo had it from the Elves that a Dark Lord from many ages past had marred all that had been wrought by the Valar; whatever they were, some kind of creatures who were good folk and could put earth and sky and tree and water where they wished. Falco decided that he would not want to meet up with such folk; surely the would be bigger trouble than any Man he had ever met, no matter how 'good'.

He scrabbled up the first low rise, stones and brambles creating a maze every step of the way. He worked his way back down the uneven ground to the stony and uncomely valley beyond, and saw footprints that appeared to be recent. Falco's curiosity was piqued right away. Who could this be? Was it friend or enemy of Eodwine's House? Was it a thief or robber? He followed the footprints, going more quietly and cautiously than ever.
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