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"So, what caused you to travel all this way from Rohan?"
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Laurie sat back and smoothed the fold of her white dress. She smiled a little as she contemplated her next words, but her thoughts were disrupted as Pio stopped by the table with a basket of funny looking nuts. Laurie nibbled on the end of one cautiously before enthusiastically popping the rest in with an exclamation of surprise.
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‘Marvelous!’ cried Laurie, in delight, as her fingers popped open another casing and skillfully deposited the nut in her mouth. ‘What are these called?’
‘Peanuts, I believe he called them.’ Pio leaned down to pour a drink for the woman and her table mate. ‘He said they were one of the treats the handlers would give the oliphaunts.’
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Laurie's eyes widened and her jaw dropped as Pio walked calmly off to another table. She turned back to Rave who was also eating the strange peanuts and surveying Laurie's expression with amusement.
"Did you hear that? She said oliphants! I thought they were only the stuff of nursery rhymes and old wives' tales! Do you think she was perhaps joking?" Laurie added with a hint of skeptisism; she had often been laughed at for being so gulliable.
Rave laughed and shook her head. "I do not know, I have heard rumours that such creatures exist so perhaps she was telling the truth."
Laurie mulled over this in her mind for a few minutes, snacking on more peanuts as she thought. A moment later she turned back to Rave's original question.
"My home is Rohan, as said before. My father, Eodane, would take me with him on business to Minas Tirith. He is very involved in the relationships between the two countries, and I was his companion on the long rides between home and the White City. Because I was so young, I was allowed to sit in on the many political and theological discussions held in the Tribunate of Merethrond. From these discussions, I learned much about the world outside and the world of elves always fascinated me more than anything else, I could never hear enough of the old tales. Often times, the soldiers and ambassadors from Dol Amroth would tell me the old stories, and even taught me a few basic phrases in Elvish." The lady in white bent her head and sighed before continuing her story.
"I was not content with such knowledge, however. I wanted to see everything for myself and experience such things first hand. So one day, I bid my father and brothers farewell and left with my horse Nell, a few provisions, and an old map. It was extremely rash," Laurie admitted with a laugh, her blue eyes twinkling, "and I soon found out that life in the Wild was not easy. But, some way or other, I found my way to this inn. My journeys have not had any definite destination, except that my paths have always been bent towards the sea. I feel I am drawn there, for whatever reason, and someday I will see the sea, whose waves some have described like the wind rippling through the grass in my homeland." Laurie paused and ate a few more peanuts, returning from her memories. She turned back to Rave who had listened very politely throughout. "Until then, I am happy to be here, the people are fascinating and I feel very blessed to have stumbled upon it."