[Ealasaide]

Kaldir

"Might as well jump in with both feet if I’m to drown," Gilly said. "I just realized that here I’ve been rattling on and I have not any idea which side you fought on during the War. Please tell me your sympathies didn’t lie with the Dark Lord, or I may have just as well slit my own throat and Benia’s too. Oh what a thought!"

Kaldir laughed softly. "Relax, Mrs. Banks. Had I been allowed to fight, it would have been on the side of the king." He lowered the hot mug of tea from where he had been holding it against his face and took a sip. "I was a guest in Sauron's dungeons for the majority of the War, if you must know."

He rose to his feet and stretched his back. Due largely to the ministrations and gentle chatter of the hobbit, the dream was finally receding. He no longer saw the world in the surrealistic detail of the nightmare realm. And the touch of Naiore's hand no longer lingered against his face, though the silken threads of her voice did still hang in the back of his mind like a black widow's web. He knew that the dream had been just that, a dream, but he also knew that it had been something more. Naiore was not sleeping.

He nodded toward Benia's still form. "Jack Nightshade sounds like a clever man. Why does he not protect his daughter? I am not the only wolf about."

Gilly shook her head. "Oh, Mr. Kaldir, Jack Nightshade's been dead nigh on three, four, years now. Miss Benia says he never did get over the loss of her mother."

"What happened to her?"

"She was killed, begging your pardon, Mr. Kaldir. She was killed by bounty hunters."

Kaldir's face darkened as he turned and took a long look at the sleeping face of the desert woman. To think, the mother had been murdered by bounty hunters, and he had come so close to murdering the daughter himself. And for what? For nothing more than the fact that the wrong blood ran in her veins. The wrong tattoos adorned her hands. And she had no one to protect her.

He cast a quick glance at the hobbit. No one, that is, except Mrs. Banks.

"She's lucky to have you," he said abruptly. "We should all have such loyal friends."

"That's kind of you to say, Mr. Kaldir," protested Gilly. "But I can't say as I have been much help to her."

"You're here, aren't you?" he asked. "I'm sure that's of inestimable value to her." He paused and a bitter smile passed across his scarred face. "Believe me. I know of what I speak."

While he would never wish the torment he had endured during his imprisonment on even an enemy, much less a friend, he knew how much easier it would have been to endure had he not felt so forsaken by his brethren. They had left him to die. Perhaps he would have been better off running with a band of women and hobbits. Smiling to himself at the mental image, he bent and picked up the stew pot he had set aside a few minutes earlier and lifted the lid, smelling the rich aroma of apples and stewed venison. Gilly held out a spoon.

Taking it, he thanked her. "Now, Mrs. Banks," he added. "It's time you got some sleep. We will have a difficult day tomorrow. I will stand watch for the remainder of the night."

He watched as the hobbit settled down into her blankets, then, taking what was left of the stew with him, moved away from the fire to a place near the horses where his back was protected, yet he could command a full view of the camp. If they had any hope of catching up to Naiore before she reached the Old Forest and the Shire, they would have to increase their pace on the morrow. Following her tracks, he saw the direction in which the Ravener was heading and guessed at her intentions. Hobbits of the Shire had destroyed the one ring and Sauron with it, leaving Naiore's ambitions in ruin. She would have her revenge, the king's edict notwithstanding. He had decided to say nothing of his suspicions to Mrs. Banks, however, until it became inevitable. The Shire was her home.

As for Benia Nightshade... what to do about her? He frowned darkly. With her strikingly exotic appearance, she was not the sort to blend easily into backdrop of Middle Earth. Without the protection of a husband or father, it was amazing to him that she had not already run afoul of bounty hunters and been hauled back to Harad or worse. If he were to set her free, how long would it be before another of his kind found her? Knowing what he did of his profession, he decided her prospects were not good. He would very much like to keep her with him, but if he did, it could not be as his prisoner. She would have to stay willingly. If she could do that, he would be more than happy to take on the role of her protector.

The question he pondered through the long, dark hours of his watch was how to get her to choose to stay.