[Bêthberry]

"Orc's blood, don't you know how to fry eggs? What did your mother teach you?" The thin man, pushing his yellow, straggly hair out of his eyes and off his face, also pushed the young girl away from the fire.

Catrina recoiled from Kiatus, stung by his tone as much as by the physical rebuff. How could she be expected to know how to cook breakfast like that? And why did he have to speak to her that way? Yet she didn't voice these thoughts. She was too surprised by the changes that had overcome him and by the completely foreign way of life they now pursued.

"I tried. I couldn't help it."

"Yah. Sure. You can't help anything." He stopped for a moment, getting his temper under control. "Let's just get it done and be on our way. The sooner we get to Minas Tirith the sooner we can deliver the jewellery and be safe with our own money."

"I'll go pack the bedrolls and other packs, then."

An indistinct "Ummn" was the man's only response, as he tried to trace back how he got this albatross around his neck.

* * * * * * * * *

A brisk wind whipped around the two men, as if taunting them to dare finish their task, and then pounded out over the plains, the grasslands undulating in twisting masses under the assault. The weather was enough to ensure secrecy; the men had not needed the extra precaution created by the mirky blackness of a moonless night sky. Yet their words were often lost on the wind and they had to repeat themselves.

"Say again," called out the short, unkempt one, his long hair blowing around his head and obscuring his face from full view. He held the scabbard of his sword tightly, as if to stop its banging against his leg in the strong wind.

"There's a wooden chest in the eating room, where the family hoards its money, savings, and a few pieces of silver metalwork. Bring it to me and I know who will pay us a pretty penny for it; you'll get half," answered the taller man, his scraggly blonde hair blown away to reveal a broad face, bony nose, and thin mouth.

"Risk discovery for only half? What makes you think I can't pawn it myself?" The words "pawn it myself" whistled down onto the prairie, echoing.

"You'll be risking nothing. It's just a family, women and children, no arms. The man will be away. The metal work is old, ornate. If you want it's worth, you'll have to find the right broker." "Broker, broker, broker" went rolling like a staccato out over the plains.

"There'll be no arms, no men to defend?"

"None. I'll see to that."

"What'll you do after?" The short man was not convinced, his mind already racing with other possibilities to improve his return for his efforts.

"That's my own concern. Do it right, and there'll be more jobs for you in the future."

Almost knocking the men off their stance, the wind increased its speed, picking up dust and even small twigs and sand as it picked up speed and veered round and round. Buffeted, the two men moved to their horses, completing their deal away from the interference of the weather or any prying eyes.

* * * * * * *

"By all the foul orc-kin left in this world, what have you done?" screamed Kiatus as the flames spread throughout the small wooden home.

Kiatus had remained hidden in the copse while Uldor had led three others into the homestead. Halasan had fallen for the ruse and the home was defenseless. Kiatus knew without cajoling the information from Catrina where the chest stood. Yet the treacherous, foul Easterlings had worked their own double cross, setting fire to the home to mask their thievery and to force Kiatus into turning tail and running.

Uldor laughed in his face.

"You stupid sot. Do you think we would let you take the wealth of the homestead and leave us with a few pieces of worthless silver?"

Suddenly, without warning, Uldor pulled his knife on Kiatus, nearly slashing the man"s chest. Kiatus stumbled, held up an arm to protect himself, and then withdrew in unbelieving horror, the screams of Gwen and the boys ringing in his ears, the sharp acrid smell of burning human flesh assaulting his nose.

He fled, a liquid horror running through his limbs and befuddling his brains. He kept shaking his head as if to remove the sounds and smells which strangled his senses. He came, incoherent, upon a terrified Catrina, hiding by the rowan tree with the horses. This time there was no nightingale singing, only a flock of vultures eying them from the treetop. The frogs were silent, too.

* * * * * *

Catrina slunk into the dark corner of ally way where Kiatus and Deriath were conversing in low tones. The face of Kiatus was animated, full of insistence, urgency, pleading. Deriath stepped back calmly, slyly, turning his eyes towards the girl with an air of knowing appraisal which brought hot shame to her face. Shrugging, he looked back at Kiatus, shook his head, and held up his hand as if to make a counter bargain.

Catrina watched Kiatus rub his hand across his mouth, taking two or three quick sharp breaths. He turned to her.

"We're going with Deriath to his trading post on the River Snowborn, near where the Entwash joins it. He's got work for us to do, carrying some trinkets to Minas Tirith for him. You've just become a merchant's runner, Catrina."

* * * * * * * * *

After the rebuff over cooking breakfast, Catrina retreated to the back bedroom behind Deriath's trading post and became lost in thought and tears as she packed hers and Kiatus' worldly possessions into small canvas bags.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The bird cherry trees were in bloom, the scent of their flowers filling the bower, their white hues glowing almost luminescent in the gloaming amongst the dark green canopy. The trees were silhouetted against the deep azure of the sky. Peeking out from amongst the grasses, fritillarias and narcissus and sweet woodruff matted the ground like a blanket of embroidered colour. Here and there fireflies danced, tiny sparks of evanescent brilliance. And off in the distance a nightingale sang, blending strangely but melodiously with the cadences of frogs in the nearby pond. Beneath a rowan tree stood a very young woman, her face alight with the soft radiance of youth , and an older man, his eyes sparkling with charm and merriment. They were speaking in the whispered but laughing tones of secret communication. In her hands she held a silken, emerald green handkerchief, edged it seemed with snowflakes, so ornate was the lace.

"I've never seen anything as beautiful, as lovely," she spoke in a hushed tone.

"Then you have not seen yourself in a mirror," he replied, his tone holding no sense of insincerity or mockery though his mouth held back the faintest outline of a grin.

Laughter bubbled out of her.

"You flirt with me and tease me."

"I assure you not. You don't know how lovely you are."

"Made lovely in your eyes, you mean."

"Now who is teasing."

She looked up into his eyes and made a slight, almost involuntary movement towards him. He bent towards her.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Terror and fear thickened a voice which resounded with panic and incomprehension.

"But why do we have to leave? My family is there. We need to help them."

Struggling to overcome his incoherence, his own shock, the full terror of the consequences of their actions, Kiatus spoke bruskly but not cruelly.

"There is no help possible. It is not a sight fit for your eyes. We have been betrayed." A taunt fury clothed this voice, as if in one short space of time an entire possibility of hope were wiped out.

A moan and grievous wail burst forth from the young girl, who nearly fell to her feet. The man reached to her, grabbed her shoulders, and held her up.

"We have no time for mourning, else we too shall be slain. Come quickly now, or not at all."

And from the distance came the sound of falling timber, crackling flames, cries of animals. She hoped not humans. Then Kiatus pulled her out of her stupor, towards the horses and escape.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Dazed, confused, the girl stared glumly out the window, her back to the man, salt lines trailing down her blotched face.

"Tears come easily to you these days, but they won't help us out. Pity isn't what we need, but action and money."

"You never used to speak like this to me."

"You never used to blubber so much."

"You are cruel."

"You are ridiculous and taxing."

She sobbed more.

"Look, I'm not trying to make you cry. I'm trying to make you understand. We have to get out of here quickly. The Easterlings are after us. They think we have the goods they wanted from your family's homestead. Deriath won't loan me the money; he wants me to run trade for him. We aren't in a position to argue."

"I don't like him. He's shifty. I don't like the way he looks at me."

"You think life's all about romance. It isn't."

She sobbed even harder. He threw up his hands, the tension in his psyche stretched out into each finger, spread wide and taunt in an act of desperate incomprehension and frustration.

"Oh shut up. We've got to get to this smith Estomer. We need a weapon before we leave."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"Come and eat," Kiatus yelled.

Catrina stuffed the last bit of clothing into the canvas bags and lifted it out into the hallway. As she did so, a small piece of cloth fluttered to the bare plank flooring, falling into an empty knot hole. A small green silk handkerchief. It settled passively into the dust of the floor.