I saw Miss Taite again at the Pony, the day after goin' to Hookworth to get my bow, and after doing a bit of practice with it. (My left arm still stings from the string hittin' it. It's been too long since I picked the bow up.) She asked about why I had the bow and I mentioned that I were teaching Lumina archery. She was… well, I don't know as suspicious is the right word for it, but she said as might be as this were just an excuse for to be together, and said the most unbelievable things about me bein' handsome. I mean, I know I'm not awful or nothin', at least to them as like fellers to be outdoorsy and don't mind them smellin' of horse. But neither am I handsome. I'm just sort of ordinary, and a bit too craggy. Imagine what Miss Taite would think if'n she saw Leoffweard! We even got to jokin' as I could get her and Lumina and all the other pretty lasses in Bree together so's I could teach 'em all archery at once. (Leastwise I think that's what the joke were. I got a bit confused there a bit when she were talkin' like ever'one I knew was a pretty lass, even the Dwarves, and I realized, I wouldn't rightly know. Maybe Blida and Maddoct are Dwarf-ladies and I been callin' 'em the wrong thing all this time! I hope I ain't offended 'em.)
Well, Miss Taite weren't exactly right, but she weren't exactly wrong neither. I mean, Lumina does truly want for to learn archery. And as I told Miss Taite, she couldn't've done made that up as an excuse just to get to spend time with me, since when she mentioned it, she had no way to know I did any archery. I only told her I were a stable-keeper, and you don't expect them to have a bow, as a rule. And I ain't picked up the bow in near two year, so it's not like she might see a callus on my fingers or somethin'. But for all that, she, Lumina I mean, did go to sayin' that even if we was done with teachin' of archery -- which we might be sooner'n I dreamed as she takes to it like a natural! -- that she'd want to find another reason to keep me around.
Which for all as I said to Miss Taite couldn't be, it makes me a bit dizzy to think on't. I mean, Lumina is of a foreign sort and I reckon there's folk around Bree might not look twice at her, on account of her bein' so dark and unusual; but even those folk got to know she's pretty as a night sky in spring. And the way she talks I reckon she's smart and educated besides. It even seems she's got coin like maybe she's highborn where she's from. What could a lass like that want with a fool like me, common as the dirt she'd shake off her shoes?
But maybe I shouldn't go lookin' at this so hard tryin' for to find reasons to disbelieve it. I mean, look at the feller Aelfwyn married. Ever'one said as she were the greatest beauty in the Westfold, and her husband, the iron-smith, is as plain a fellow as you could ask for -- not just in how he looks but ever'thing about him. And if you looked at them apart you'd swear they'd never even talk to one 'nother, but when you see them together, it's just as certain as they belong together, like two folk always knew each other and just hadn't met yet to recognize it.
I don't even know what to call this thing with Lumina. I mean, should I call it courtin'? That brings all manner of tricksome questions in, questions what I know it's too early to ask, but what I also wonder if I shouldn't never ask. I think maybe I shouldn't think about where this goes or what to name it. Just let things happen, if'n they will, and let them be whatever they end up bein'. We can name it after we found it, if it even turns out to be a thing as needs a name.
If it don't turn out it were just a misunderstanding, or a fever dream, or somethin'. I sure hope not.
