[Primrose Bolger]

Her tiny face, brown as an acorn from the forest oak, peeked out from a ragged curtain of black hair. From the shadows of the great oak in the Inn yard, her dark eyes surveyed the Green Dragon. The great structure stood like a small mountain, she thought, cast up high from the earth that bore it.

Yellow light pushed back the darkness as it spilled from the windows, and highlighted the figures of those who passed by them. Tall, slender Elves – they would be beautiful, she knew. She had seen them in earlier days, passing through her woods. Grey cloaked figures passing silently beneath the silvered-grey leaves of the forest. And Men – they would have stern faces, sad, unused to laughter. The ones she liked best were the little ones who lived in this land . . . small like her. Close to the earth, they were, and lovely in their laughter.

Kiera pulled her tattered brown cloak about her and drew closer to the Inn itself. Up the steps she went, and stood on the wide porch, her hand flat on the door. Voices drifted out to her from the open window to her left. Too many voices, too much for her tonight. Her courage wavered and she ran quickly back down the steps, her bare feet stirring the dust as she ran back to the tree.

Quick as a red squirrel she shinnied up the trunk, her feet and hands finding purchase on the rough bark. One of the tree’s great limbs welcomed her, and she settled in to pass the night. Her head nestled in the crook of her arm as she lay along the limb, and she drew up her little brown legs beneath her cloak as best she could.

The night breeze rustled the leaves around her, a familiar, comforting sound. And she passed into dreaming of the Old Land she was bound for . . . a sea of trees, she had heard in the stories round the cooking fires . . . Druwaith laur . . .