The Green Dragon Inn - Part 6

[Amanaduial the archer]

Beren, looking bemused, smiled politely then more warmly at Aman, before turning to go out the door. For a moment, she hesitated, about to do...something...grab his hand maybe, call him back...

But she didn't, and the time passed as he turned and left. The Innkeeper clicked her fingers angrily, but would talk to him later; there was, regretably, too much to do now. Now, who was it who had offered help...

Spying Annalaliath sitting just finishing her last bite of food as she sketched, Aman began to move towards her, careful not to knock into the four hobbits who, between them, were manoevuring what looked like a bedhead through the crowded Inn (the phrase 'too many cooks' flitted through her mind'), and towards Annalaliath, efficiently deflecting and redirecting the flustered shirelings and Green Dragon customers who thronged the Inn. Reaching her goal, she cleared her throat, causing the elf to look her as she swallowed her last bite.

"Good day, Annalaliath. Now...I believe you offered to help?"

The elf smiled, looking around the Inn, and raised an eyebrow. Aman grinned back. "I know, and on such a quiet night..."

The elf laughed. "What can I do?"

***

After directing Annalaliath upstairs to see Buttercup and help with upstairs (Aman was beginning to feel really sorry for the hobbit waitress!), Aman turned again to survey the Inn. Then the sound of a loud voice reached her ears, from the stable area and, annoyed but worried, bearing in mind the last episode with such a raucous in the stables, Aman dashed out quickly, skirts pulled upo slightly, out towards the stables. She was met by a furious looking hobbit who nearly ran into her. She was a pretty little thing, dark hair bobbing above her shoulders and framing a face which was, while pretty, not the face of someone weak minded. Her beauty would probably have been greater...had she not been nearly spitting with rage.

"Oh, I am sorry -" Aman started, but as the girl bustled past she stopped indignantly. She hadn't even acknoledged it. Still, duty ever called. "Can I help you, miss?"

The hobbit didn't reply, simply cast a filthy look back at the Innkeeper before continuing away at a cracking pace. She was muttering something darkly under her breath. Something which sounded dangerously like a repeated 'I'm gonna kill him, I am going to kill him...'

Her brow creasing in annoyance at the rudeness of the hobbit girl and mild worry for 'him' whoever he was, Aman turned at a noise from within the stable. Like a horse shifting, or maybe a soft snort, or...well, it sounded silly, but it was like a sigh. Sighing herself, Aman turned to look into the stables, picking up the lantern from where it hung on a hook by the door.

"Hello?" She called boldly into the semi-light. "Hello?"

No answer, but the sound of someone being very, very quiet, a sound of its own sometimes. Aman was about to try again when an idea struck her and she lowered her voice. "The hobbit girl has gone."

There it was again, that sort-of-sigh. Aman spun around to one of the stalls where she reckoned it had come from and held the lantern in front of it, fighting to urge to cry 'ah-HA!'. But what she was confronted with was not a horse-theif or pickpocket, or errant little boy even...but a messy haired by still rather striking hobbit. Hamson.