[piosenniel]

‘Who was that you were talking about?’ repeated Piosenniel, pulling back a chair at the kitchen table. Hob had risen when she sat down, and pouring her a cup of tea from the pot keeping warm on the hearth, placed it by her hand. She smiled up at him, then glanced round the table. ‘Well . . .?’ she asked again, taking a sip of the sweet brew.

‘Now Miz Pio,’ answered Cook, passing her the plate of cookies from the sideboard, ‘no need to concern yourself with Inn business any more. Prim took care of it just fine, didn’t you.’

Prim nodded her head in agreement. ‘It was just some pesky tradesman with something we didn’t need. Cook and I sent him on his way. I doubt he’ll be back soon.’

Piosenniel frowned at the look that passed between the two Hobbits, but let it pass. She set her cup down clumsily on the table as a wave of pain gripped her round the middle. It surprised her with its intensity and she was glad when it retreated.

She looked up from it, to find Prim looking at her with concern, while Cook nodded her head up and down as if she expected something like this might be an expected occurrence. ‘Been having them long, dearie?’ she asked in a kindly tone, watching Pio’s hands unclench and her face smooth out once again.

‘This is only the second one today. In fact the first one is why I came out to see you. What can you tell me of these pains, and what comes after them. What can I expect and when. It will help me plan for it.’

‘Plan for it!’ Cook chortled at the thought of planning for something that followed its own course at its own time. But there was Miz Pio leaning forward, her elbows resting on the table, waiting for an answer. Cook sighed, and collected her thoughts. She laughed again. Here she was, a simple Hobbit, instructing an Elf on something. The thought tickled her no end.

‘All right, Miz Pio, now listen closely, and stop me any time you need to . . .’

Cook launched into her lesson on the ways of childbirth, as Pio sat taking in every word. Her eyes growing wide at some of the details and examples that Cook gave to emphasize certain points.

‘You sure you want to be here, Hob?’ asked Prim. Hob said he’d helped with many a foaling, and his sisters had all had babies so he knew some of the details. But he and Minta hoped to have a family soon, and he might as well know all of what was to happen.

‘Suit yourself,’ said Prim, getting up to make a fresh pot of tea and heap the cookie plate once again. This could last quite a while, she thought to herself. Settling herself down, cookie in hand, she listened closely to what Cook was telling the Elf, throwing out every so often a fact or story of her own.