[Pivli]

"Now I have a question for you, Miz Greengage," Alcarillo announced, "You must be very familiar with the Shire. Can you tell me where the nearest inn that lies eastwards is? I'm traveling that way, you see, and I am somewhat unused to sleeping at the side of the road." He smiled pleasantly at her.

Violet’s attention had wandered for a moment – to the strange fellow who’d come in the door. Taller than a Hobbit, but not so tall as one of the Big Folk. And built very sturdy, he was. She dug down deep, in the stories she’d heard about Mister Bilbo and his adventures. Something niggled at the edges of her memory as she looked at the fellow’s beard and yellow cloak. A Dwarf! Yes, that’s the name she remembered from the old stories. My, my! Who’d have thought she would actually clap eyes on one.

The sound of the Elf’s voice drew her back. She heard the rising tone at the end of his words and knew he’d asked a question of her. Gather your wits back, Violet! she chided herself, piecing together what words of his she’d heard.

‘Well now, Master Nession – an Inn eastways down the road, you say. Mind you I haven’t traveled all that much. But I have gone as far as Frogmorton. ‘Bout twenty miles or so as the crow flies down the road. My mister took me there once when he was delivering some barrels he’d made to the inn there. The Floating Log, it’s called. Nice place; not quite as big as the Dragon. But very pleasant.’ She paused for a moment, thinking about some others of the Inns her husband had brought his barrels to. ‘Another day’s ride will bring you to the bridge that crosses the Brandywine. There’s a comfortable place there – The Bridge Inn, run by one of the Brandybuck families I heard tell.’

Violet took a sip of her tea; the steaming liquid warming her insides. ‘Oh, I’ve just thought of another, though it’s a bit off the Great Road. It was one of Mister Greengages favorites in the Eastfarthing.’ She furrowed her brow, recall where he said it was located. ‘Just before you get to the Brandywine River, there’s a small road that turns off toward the south, toward Stock. Less than an hour I should think, brings you to The Golden Perch. Finest beer in the Eastfarthing they say. And a fine place to put up if you like to fish at all. My husband did, bless him. “You had your choice,” he would say. “The Stockbrook or the Brandywine or both. Always come home with your creel full!” Many’s the fat smoked perch caught in those waters we’d have to tide us through the winters when meat was scarce.’

She looked over at Alcarillo, wondering if Elves fished and such. ‘Do you fish, Master Nession?’ she asked, the words bubbling up from her curious mind.