(O.O.C. - The following post was written by Child of the Seventh Age)
Amarantha leaned surreptitiously towards Piosenniel, cupping her hand over her mouth and whispering to the Elf. "I got a heap o' stories, maam, about Mistress Cami. Passed down from my great grandmum. And she got 'em from her great grandmum. Only we like to keep them in the family, if you see what I mean."
Then Amarantha sat back and spoke a bit louder. Not much louder, but just enough for Piosenniel to hear if she strained her ears.
"You see, Mistress Cami was a bit strange. Always talking to fairies and wizards she was, and even creatures queerer than that. You got to watch folk like that, especially those big fairies with all their airs. Up to no good, I say. There's tales I've heard that would make your heart stop about some of the scraps she and her young 'uns got into there in the forest, the one they called Greenwood. Especially the one they called Gamba. A boatload of trouble he was, but that's a tale for another day."
"Not that any of the hobbits would complain to her face. Not a one! She and her daughter Rose were the best healers in the vale, and folks was always coming to them for help. A Harfoot she was, nice and brown, but even the Fallohides came begging for her to make them well." At the thought of those Fallohide masters coming to Mistress Cami, Aramantha's face broke into a wide toothless grin.
I've heard tell the poor ones she took care of without charging a farthing, but the ones with money, she made sure to get her fair share. She wouldn't take no guff from anybody, no matter who they were."
"Never married as far as I know. Had suitors aplenty I've been told but slammed the door in their faces. Don't know why. But she always took care of her little 'uns, and when they got bigger helped with the grandbabies too."
"They say she was mighty busy learning the little ones their letter and taking the bigger lads and lasses to train them with herbs and healing lore. When she got older, she was tuckered out, I think. And the thing that took it out of her was seeing the hobbit clans split up and go their separate ways. She said it was plumb stupid to have hobbits going off like that in twenty different directions. They'd never make it to where they were supposed to go. But nobody listened to her common sense. You know how it is when a Man gets set in his way, and a stupid way it is, too, sometimes!"
"So she packed her bags and said goodbye to all her kin, and went off somewhere over the mountain by herself. Said there were things she'd been putting off too long. And it was real important. Something about a promise left undone. Never came back…. never came back. Just disappeared Some folks say the wizards got the fairies to take her in. Me, I think those fairies liked her so much they spirited her off to dance under the hills. Could be dancin' still today as far as I know. Like I said, she was real strange."
"Does that give you what you want, maam?" Piosenniel looked up and smiled sadly over at Aramantha. "You've been very helpful, but I wonder if you'd try and remember just one more thing."
"Did Mistress Cami ever speak of a people who changed shapes? Are there any stories about that?"
Aramantha looked uncomfortable and stared up at the roof beams. It seemed as if she was hoping that Piosenniel would disappear.
She shook her head. "We don't like to talk about that. It just ain't natural. Even the faries don't do that. But I'll admit, Mistress Cami had a thing about those strange folk. Some whispers she had magic words that would make the strange folk come and talk to her. Don't know nothing about that though."
"Is that all?" probed the Elf, fixing a steady eye on her.
Aramantha shifted uncomfortably in her seat. "Maybe one other thing. She had these wizards as friends. The two of them would pop in and out every now and then. The grey one, everybody said was real smart, and Mistress Cami liked him lots."
"Only lots of times, the grey one was busy and the brown one came instead. Mistress Cami used to get plenty mad at him. She'd start throwing dishes and things. She'd glare at him real bad and say the only reason she even let him be around was for the sake of an old, dear friend. Something about him having a special friendship with those unnatural people who keep changin' themselves around. And why didn't he have the sense to tell Mistress Cami that just five minutes before, and he would have saved them all a lot of trouble. And how it would catch up to him one day."
"Don't know what Mistress Cami meant by all that. Never understood a bit of it at all. But great grandmum made me repeat it word for word. Maybe it would be important some day."
"That's about it for now. I got other stories. 'Bout how her kids used to battle the spiders and how she shot an Orc or two with her bow but we'll let those wait for another day."
Piosenniel fixed her eyes on Granny, then leaned over and kissed her on her scraggly curls. "You've helped me more than you could possibly know."
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