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Old 01-29-2004, 04:27 AM   #84
piosenniel
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Sting

Gondor

There was a steaming mug of tea waiting for her when she returned. Pio pulled the jar of honey toward her and spooned a generous helping into her mug. A few sips, enjoyed in silence, and then she pulled the thin leather satchel she’d brought from her room up from the floor beside her and began pulling out the sheaves of papers within.

Some were folded, tied in discrete piles with thin leather thongs. Letters from Bird for the most part, though some were from the librarian in Rivendell – responses to inquiries she had made. Others were loose notes, from research she’d done in the library in Gondor, and from travelers she’d spoken to when she’d visited the docks and the inns near them. Last were the maps she’d copied or borrowed or bought in her search for detailed information on the southern lands.

With each year that had passed, the stacks of letters had grown thinner. Their plan, made long ago on the deck of the Lonely Star, for Pio to research leads on the whereabouts of the Skinchangers and Bird to do the legwork had started with great enthusiasm. Bird had dutifully followed up on the information she’d gotten from Pio and written back often on how it had panned out. And to be honest, all of it seemed to lead only into blind alleys.

Pio smiled, knowing that even though Bird always had tucked in the back of her thoughts her desire to find her Skinchanger kin, her mind was a lively one. And often other more immediate and interesting pursuits would capture it and draw her in different directions.

In the early years, Bird would travel once or twice a year to Gondor, she told him – making her appearance as Auntie Bird to her adoring nieces and nephew, bringing interesting and exotic gifts from the bazaars of the south, and taking her share of the Star’s profits to fund her travels. ‘But in the last two years there have been no visits, and I have received just this one letter from her,’ Pio said, holding up the slim folded paper. ‘It is the one that the Innkeeper from the Seventh Star gave to me when first I met you. Bird writes of growing unrest in Umbar; says she will be lying low for a while. There is no mention, though, of any contact she has made with her kin, or any further leads she has found.’ Pio rubbed the back of her neck, worrying once more, what sort of trouble her friend might have gotten into. ‘I had hoped,’ she said, ‘to have gone south on the trading mission with my husband, Mithadan. And while there to make contact with her.’

To change the subject, Pio reached for the roll of maps and untied them, spreading each out on the table. Most were pen and ink drawings of various parts of the southern lands, some more detailed than others showing landforms and the ever important places in the desert areas where one could find water. Her newest acquisition, the ship’s journal, gave details of the southern coast – coves, inlets, shoals, water depths, and other information of importance to mariners seeking safe passage from the Bay of Belfalas to areas well south of the Havens of Umbar.

‘What’s this?’ asked Baran, fingering a small grayish colored map of some odd material. It was rolled up separately from the maps on vellum and had an odd feel to his fingers as he touched it.

‘Ah! That was a find of mine in one of the less reputable taverns in Minas Anor. An old friend had gotten it from some folk passing through. Olive-skinned men, as I recall, who spoke in a language he had not heard before. They were somewhere from the south and east of Gondor, or so they indicated with maps crudely drawn on the table top. One of them had a very limited grasp of the Common Speech and indicated this was drawn on mumak hide. It was one of the items my friend received from them in payment for meals and drinks.’

Pio untied the skin and flattened it on the tabletop. It was a worn map drawn in now fading blue ink on the greyish colored hide. An indecipherable script in faint red ink edged the irregularly shaped regions drawn within its boundaries. ‘Look at these,’ she said, pointing to the intriguing symbols drawn in black. Scattered about the regions in discrete groupings, were cross-hatched areas. In the middle of each area was drawn a crude stick figure, each with the drawing of a different animal, insect, or bird where their head would be.

‘We could find no one to tell us what this script was or what it might say. And no one who knew exactly where this place in the south is.’ She moved her finger from stick figure to stick figure. ‘These, too, remain a mystery to us. Bird shrugged them off, saying they might only be places where the hunting is good, or might represent outlandish gods of some sort. A wise old fellow we both knew thought that perhaps the Ithryn Luin had a hand in the making of this map. He thought he noted the Tengwar marks for Pallando and Alatar worked in along one of the boundary lines along the edge. He also said that this script, which he could not translate for us, looked to be of the Haradic writing style.’ She shook her head and pushed the skin to one side, near the pile of papers that were stacked in front of Baran. ‘In the end, we decided it was of no use to us. But still, I find it intriguing.’

Baran’s mug sat empty by him as he picked through her meager store of information. Pio picked it up and held it along with hers. ‘I am having another cup. Would you like another mug of tea, also . . . or something of a stronger persuasion?’

Last edited by piosenniel; 04-07-2004 at 12:24 PM.
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