They stood and gathered up their belongings after the rain had abated enough to make travel possible again. Flicking away the tip of his finished smoke, the traveler asked Kitten where their next destination was. His tone was one of genuine nonchalance; as long as the road was open and free, he would wander wherever it carried him.
She wondered aloud if there was anything to bar them from just staying within the Shire for as long as they wished. The idea had merit, the traveler admitted. The land was as abundant as any he knew, its people exceedingly civil and peaceful. The pipe-weed was excellent and everywhere for the taking. Yet the idea tapered off as the daydream it was; they both knew they could never remain here indefinitely, for reasons left silently within themselves.
Kitten unfolded her map and studied it, the sketches she had made on its reverse clearly visible in the hazy post-rain sunlight. The traveler noticed a different drawing he had not seen the evening prior: a sketch of himself, sleeping by a campfire. It was more detailed than some of the other sketches around it, as if she had taken quite a bit of time in its creation. He was lying on his back, head pillowed by his worn canvas rucksack, his hood slipped off his face in the picture. She had been gracious in her rendition - his features looked softened and agreeable in his likeness, hardly as angular and weatherworn as he knew them to be.
She folded her map again and announced that she wanted to visit the grand library in Tuckborough. The traveler seemed surprised that the half-men valued scholarship and found the idea of sturdy farmers and fat bakers keeping volumes of ancient tomes quaint, though he knew that most peoples kept some record of their version of history if only in song. He asked her about her own people then, but she demurred, saying she knew nothing of where her line came from and that her father kept the family reclusive.
They arrived on the doorstep of the Great Smials, Kitten checking for posted signage before opening the round green hobbit door and stepping inside. The traveler banged his head on the doorframe as he entered after her. His head throbbed for a few moments, and he made certain to keep well below the low rafters from then on.
Kitten walked ahead of him with a silent confidence that seemed at odds with the shy girl he knew. Being so near to a repository of knowledge must infuse her with determination, he thought, and he liked seeing her with poise. He fell in line behind her as she made her way around the multi-tunneled mansion, heedless of the open stares of its occupants.
She came to a case of assorted leatherbound books and ran her thin fingertips along the spines of the ones that caught her eye, reading the titles and occasionally pulling one off the shelf to flip through. He sought a shadowed corner along the wall to lean against as she rummaged the bookcase, wrapping his cloak around himself, concealing his knives. No sense in frightening the halfings, who were already whispering and pointing at them suspiciously now.
Kitten had just finished thumbing through a heavy cookbook when they were approached by a single brave hobbitess who cleared her throat before addressing them, wringing her hands nervously. The traveler looked as if he wanted to make himself fully vanish within his cloak when she asked if they needed assistance. He replied with an equally hesitant, “No.”
Kitten took over the exchange using her newfound assurance and asked the apprehensive librarian whether the books could be borrowed. The face of the hobbitess looked befuddled at the question, and she stammered that while the books were able to be signed out it was only allowed for residents, those who owned land and had family names with known history behind them. With the point made clear, Kitten's face deflated. The traveler pushed himself off the wall, an idea come to him. Would a resident be allowed to borrow the books on their behalf?
The librarian's face squinted in disapproval, but she did concede the possibility of an actual resident of the Shire to do so if they accepted that if the books were not returned safely, they would be responsible for reparations. The hobbitess' tone hinted that the scenario would be quite unlikely, but the man simply nodded as Kitten handed over the tomes in her hand and requested they be held for now. The librarian looked askance as she watched Kitten spin around on her heels and happily skip towards the door.
Stepping outside, this time careful with his head, he saw Kitten standing there looking supremely self-satisfied. He asked if she would now be socializing with the half-men as he opened his rucksack and withdrew his smokes. He lit one and took the first draw when she replied that they both would. He doubted that, as only one of them was charming and nice looking enough to manage such a thing, and he said so matter-of-factly. She blushed.
It was well past sundown when they walked outside of Tuckborough and made camp beneath another old, wide tree. After she built their fire, Kitten sat next to him and eyed the town up on the hill, a resolute look to her face. He studied her face in the flickering amber light of the fire and imagined her youthful visage as it might appear had she been properly groomed – that smudge of dirty sweat washed from her cheek, her tousled scarlet hair combed and pulled back from her face, perhaps pinned with a flower, and wearing a new dress in some fashionable cut and colour. She could have anything her heart desired in that life, he realized.
Gently he told her his thoughts, albeit in courser terms: cleaned up, she could choose from any number of well-titled young men in a crowded pub. She might have started from nothing, but she did not have to live a vagrant still. She could marry well.
She dismissed him outright and said she had things to do. Things to learn. The traveler asked her if what she needed to learn were in the books she wanted to borrow. One book, she answered, described what she called 'skin-changers,' beings who were able to become bears and then men again at will.
The traveler thought back, back... to many months prior, shortly after he had arrived at the gates of Bree. There was a woman he met then, what was her name? He searched his mind, but came up empty. Names no longer anchored for him and hers was no different. She had been kind, that he remembered, and Kitten's talk now of odd bear-men had drawn her up from the dredges of his memory. But she had vanished and he had assumed his once-friend had simply moved on without informing him; such was the way of things, as a transient.
Kitten went on to share another of her recurring dreams, one of running from some unknown danger. And in her dream the danger had been intercepted by a bearlike creature. She wanted the book to determine if that ephemeral creature were a 'skin-changer.' The traveler noticed that while she referred to the vision as a dream, she seemed to be recalling the details as clearly as one would a waking memory.
He let her finish before he spoke softly, saying he preferred not to dream at all, embracing emptiness when he slept. Unfailingly optimistic, Kitten replied that she had good dreams too. He asked her what the good dreams were of. Her cheeks turned crimson and she grew reluctant to answer, for reasons unfathomable to him. Why so free with nightmares but playing the good closed-handed?
Yet he let the question hang in the air, laid his head back on top of his rucksack, and closed his eyes in preparation for hobbit-charming on the morrow.
