[Elora]

The arrival of Lespheria with the thyme soaked infusion restored to Vanwe some sense of her surroundings and once more she was able to concentrate on something other than the sensation of danger that nagged at her more loudly than it had all morning. Instinct was a powerful thing, and Vanwe had learnt to heed her own. Working with the other Elf woman, self-possessed and assured, Silvanis and Gilly, Vanwe grappled inwardly for some echo of Lespheria's composure. It was wearisome to find herself more akin to a skittish deer than her own race.

The thought of her "own race" twisted within her and she kept her gaze dropped and locked on Benia. Her ankle would be pounding in sharp throbs, she sensed, but they would fade all the more quickly now that the strapping had been applied over the infusion. Vanwe glanced up to smile her thanks to Lespheria, when the Elven woman asked her question. Lespheria's gaze swung between them all, settling on each in return, and Vanwe's jaw locked on the words that tumbled within her.

She would not condemn herself by her own mouth. All was not yet lost. She could still yet keep what she sought. Vanwe clasped her hands before her in a show of more calm than she felt, more to still any trembling fingers than anything else.

"I am simply unaccustomed to healing," she said. It was no falsehood. Vanwe was indeed unused to healing. She dared not look at Silvanis or Benia, so instead she looked at a point just beside Lespheria's face upon the wall beyond her - a small thing she had learnt when dissembling many a time before. Vanwe could not discern whether Lespheria saw beyond the obvious to what rolled around within Vanwe, so for good measure she pressed on.

"Thank you for bringing the infusion. It will greatly speed healing, or such is my belief. I... have been too long away from my duties and should trouble you no longer."
Vanwe bowed again, glanced quickly at Benia, Silvanis and Gilly, who was watching the odd exchange with hobbit-like fascination, and moved on swift feet for the door. Once out in the hall she could hear the busy common-room below. More guests, more horses that meant. There were the cloths she had said she'd bring to Aman too.

Vanwe walked down the stairs with a crowded mind that still could drown out the foreboding, only to bump into Cami.

"Vanwe! We've been looking for you," she exclaimed.
"You have," Vanwe replied, foreboding spiking sharply. Who else, she wondered.
"Yes. I can't find Derufin anywhere - still passed out beneath a tree somewhere is my guess. I need saw horses and trestles for the mathoms," Cami said in a fast pitched conversation that bubbled on heedless of Vanwe's unease. Mathoms would brook no delay nor distraction.

"You plan to saw them," Vanwe said in faint confusion as they came to the bottom of the stairs. Cami favoured her with an expression that held no small measure of wonder over how such a daft mind had been able to secure even the simplest of tasks from Derufin.

"No," she said as she firmly shook her head, "I need to display them! People will come from all Farthings to see the mathoms!"

It was a self-evident truth that Cami stated. Vanwe nodded in dawning understanding.

"Ah, I know where Derufin keeps them. I can find them if you wish," the Elf offered. Cami wasted no time with detailed instructions on where they were to be installed. She asked Vanwe questions, so that she could be sure the strange Elf grasped that simple task, and satisfied with Vanwe's understanding bid her to set to it.

"As soon as I see to the horses it shall be done, Cami," Vanwe replied. Cook, who had appeared in search of Cami, sighted Vanwe and said, "Good, as Derufin will not be well pleased to find the stables untended and horses left to wait the leisure of his assistant."

Vanwe nodded, hair swaying as she swung around to make for the door. Again the weight of a gaze settled on her, and it was all she could not do to race for the door. However, once through the doorway, Vanwe moved swiftly down the stairs and even faster towards the stable where indeed horses had been hitched outside. Her hands were trembling again, and the sun a little overbright.

Vanwe plunged into the darkness of the stable, eyes blinded a moment as they adjusted. The relative quiet settled around her, and she breathed a little easier. Likely they all thought her mad. Perhaps she was. Vanwe moved to where the combs and brushes were hung on the back wall and gathered what she needed to unsaddle the awaiting horses. She paused to set the carved crane down on the small table occupied only by a thick file and a small nub of candle almost burnt down to the base on a plate.

Then, pulling her spinning thoughts harshly into mind, returned to do at least one normal thing a stable hand and assistant should be doing, even if she were mad. Blackveil snorted at her as she passed, and recalling Silvanis' words the night before Vanwe left her to move onto the others. Unbuckling saddles and hanging them over the rail, she set about rubbing them down the combing their coats.

It was physical work, but for the most part the horses did not mind the dusty, nervous Elf maiden provided she worked out a long trail and an array of grass seeds and burs picked up along the way. It was only after she had led each to where the stable's residents whiled away the day in the summer sun, that Vanwe paused again. Checking water once more, she turned back for the stables with the now empty bucket.

She still had to haul the tack and saddles in out of the elements, and she was covered in attic dust and horse. By the time she had all in it's place, tidy and clean, Vanwe felt a lethargy wash over her. Fear was exhausting and the foreboding had not abated. Vanwe placed one foot in front of the other as she made for the inn's well.

Her mind weighed heavily, her hands were still trembling and the overwhelming inclination to simply stop and let it all tumble over her dragged at it step. She distantly heard the splash of the well bucket as it hit the water, and dragged it back up to pour into her own bucket.

Vanwe paused as the well bucket stood on the stone lip. Her face was reflected in the water's surface. It was haunted, and she shuddered violently. Then, in yet another display of lunacy she upended the bucket over her head. Water sluiced over her face and through her hair to soak through her thin dress. The shaking did not stop, nor the shock of water pull her back. Vanwe gasped and sank down to sit behind the well, back against the stones.

Her head bent to rest against her arms that she had drawn over her knees. Sunlight warmed her wet hair and she knew she could not hide from the world, or herself, beside a well forever. But for the moment, it would do. Wrapped around herself, Vanwe struggled to regain some sense of stillness within herself. She needed that small peace in order to deal with others, even Lespheria who was her own kindred. Without that small inner sanctuary, she was lost. When she had it again, she would not run away as she had before. She would find Lespheria and Silvanis, and face both. She was just too tired to run anymore.