[littlemanpoet]

"There you are, Falowik!" a female voice as good as shouted. Falowik turned. One of the serving girls. He had never quite gotten their names. "Your skinny Elf Lady Uien is waiting for you in the kitchen!"

"Thank you!" he smiled as she motioned for him to follow her.

Uien was sitting at table across from a little hobbit lass all in blonde curls, pleased as punch to be the center of attention.

"Ah, there you are," Uien said. "Sit and be fed. I was just getting ready to tell Cook and Buttercup here what you and I have been doing these past few months, and they think I'm no longer the waif I looked last I was here, thanks to you."

Falowik grinned. So it was Buttercup. He mentally thanked Uien for the name, and she winked back at him as he took his place at table. There was a plate of ham and cheese sandwiches set before them, and his mouth watered quickly.

"You first, Uien," he said.

"Or I'll get none, is that it?"

"Hobbits do make good fare, better than we've had since we left the Shire."

"If you like man-food," Uien returned.

"Hobbit food's better!" Cook corrected. "I've 'eard of what they eat, and it don't compare to what's served at the Green Dragon."

"Of course not!" Falowik assured her.

"Are you an Elf too?" The little hobbit lass's eyes were wide, looking at him.

He swallowed his first mouthful. "Oh, no," he answered with a smile. "I'm a Man."

"Are you handfasted?" little Marigold asked him.

Falowik almost choked and coughed, and Uien snickered in her hand. He cleared his throat. "No. Men and Elves do not - um - handfast." Falowik was not used to the term.

"Some have," Uien murmured, half smiling.

"Why not?" little Marigold asked.

Falowik had all the answers to these questions firmly in mind, but not in a hobbit lass's speech. He looked at her blankly.

"It looks like you're finished with your cider and sandwich, Marigold, eh?" Buttercup asked, winking at Falowik. The girl nodded. "What do you say to helping me with those breadfbaskets now?"

"Yay!" the girl cried, and climbed down from her chair, eager to help Buttercup. Falowik made to wipe his brow in relief. Uien was half smiling.

Cook was at the stoves, chuckling, and said, "Now tell me what you two've been up to while you've been away."

Falowik and Uien related how they'd gone to Eryn Lasgalen with the Elven women, Lumiel and Eswen, who had accompanied them into the hills of Evendim, to bring home Lira, who had given her life in the quest. Then they had gone to Lothlorien, Uien's former home, and she had shown Falowik all the fair sights to be seen there, now almost emptied of Elves. They had come back across the mountains and stopped in Rivendell, then returned to Bree, where Falowik had been born. They had just been starting to have their first debate about where they would settle down when Uien had, on a whim, sent her thought to the Shire.

"An Elf from this Inn felt my thought, and it was thus that I learned of Derufin and Zimzi's handfasting."

"Ach, the ways of Elves are beyond me!" Cook said.

"I stand with you on that," Falowik said.

"Where is Derufin, Miss Bunce?" Uien asked.