After Greengage had left the house, Delioron went to the pigeon coops. Just like Greengage had told him, there were two coops: one marked ’G.’ and the other one ’B.’ Delioron noted that all the birds in the ’G.’ cage had yellow bands around their ankles. He opened the door and carefully grasped one of the birds to check the band around it’s leg. The pigeon seemed calm and mellow, clearly used to being handled like that. There was a single letter written on the band: ’P’. Parthadan? Delioron gave the bird a few seeds from his pocket before he returned it to it’s coop and picked up another one. Another ’P’. He examined another one. This one had a ’T’ written on it’s band. Túrher, he was fairly sure of it now. Sure enough. He returned the bird to it’s coop, closed the door and returned to the house.
Delioron picked up a pen and a piece of parchment from the drawer, sat on the chair by the fireplace and started writing a detailed report of everything he had done and learned in Bree and Archet these past days, about Greengage’s treason and the involvement of Túrher and the Rangers of Ithilien. It was a long letter, and when he was done, he picked up a small container from the drawer, folded and scrolled the parchment and pushed it inside the container.
He went back outside to the coops, picked up one of the birds marked with ’P’ and attached the container to it’s leg. Then he threw the bird up into the air and watched as it flew towards south. Parthadan would receive the report the next evening or the morning after that. Finally he opened all the doors of the bird coops.
It might take a few hours, but when the pigeons realized nobody was going to feed them anymore, they would fly back home, one by one. Some would fly to Minas Tirith, others to Henneth Annûn. At that point Túrher would realize something had gone terribly wrong, but what could he do? It was going to be all over very soon, and Túrher’s game was over, no matter what.
The fate of the ’B.’ birds would be sadder, perhaps, because they had no other place to go – this was their home. But still, even they had to eat and venture out of their coop eventually. Most of them would be captured by birds of prey or hunters from Bree and eaten. Maybe one or two lucky ones would get a second chance as someone’s pets.
Delioron returned to the house and tossed all the parchments he found from Greengage’s drawer into the fireplace. Then he searched through the house, carefully and methodically, and burned all letters, parchments and books he could find as well.
When he was done he was surprised to see the first traces of morning scattering grey light across the face of Bree through the window. It was time for him to leave. Whoever moved into this estate next would find no evidence of the previous occupants and what their lives had been like. Probably the house would remain empty for days, maybe weeks before anyone took notice that it had been abandoned.
And yet he had still not solved the puzzle. He did not know where Elwil was, and he had no time to go look for her now. To save his own life he had to stop the kidnapping of Paladin Took and let the Dúnedain know it. His intuition said it was going to happen in Buckland, because the Thain Ferumbras was there too and his intuition said Ferumbras was also a target. That’s why he had told Greengage to go there. His intuition was not always right but this time it was all he had going for him.
But why was Ferumbras a target? Why was Paladin? Why were Túrher and the Rangers of Ithilien involved in it? What was there beyond the plan to frame Delioron as the culprit for Hodhion’s murder and cause a political scandal in Minas Tirith to get rid of Parthadan?
Before he left the house he took a bath and shaved. It was already dawn when he closed the door to Greengage’s estate behind him for the last time.
He walked across the street and found a small path leading up the slope of the Bree-hill between wheat fields and small hobbit-holes. It didn’t take long before he had left the fields and houses behind him and the path turned rougher before it disappeared entirely. After a small climb Delioron arrived to the top of the Bree-hill.
It was a forested area full of tall grass, thick undergrowth and dense woods. In the south, in the foot of the Bree-hill, lay the town of Bree. Further in the east and northeast, Combe and Archet. It was the perfect camping ground for anyone wanting to oversee the movements in those towns while remaining undetected themselves.
Delioron sneaked quietly and cautiously through the bushes, aware that the Rangers were born woodsmen – this was their natural element. One wrong move, one crack of a branch might cost him his life, if the Rangers of Ithilien were still around.
Soon enough he saw the outlines of the camp looming from between trees. He could see immediately that a bigger group had camped here not so long ago, but only one tarp and one man remained, a man in green cloak and brown tunic, sitting on a tree-stump, whittling a piece of wood. Probably the one Greengage had called Ruthraon.
Delioron stepped into the edge of the camp and remained silent. It took a few moments before the Ranger became aware of his presence, lifted his gaze from his woodwork and twitched.
”Delioron!” he grunted and reached for his bow.
Delioron was already on his way, running through the woods. He heard something swoosh by his ear as he jumped over a rock and found himself standing above the town of Bree. There was a steep grassy slope, then more rocks and a very steep rockface to reach the bottom, but Delioron had no time for cautious climbing. He jumped over the rocks and slid down the rockface, his thick woolen cloak shredding against sharp rocks. Then he was on the bottom and ran through a grassy stretch of land and across the street, turned east and started running up the street. He looked over his shoulder and saw the Ranger sliding down the Bree-hill. He had left his bow behind. Running along the streets of Bree with a nocked bow would have aroused unwanted attention from the Watch, no doubt.
The point was to make it difficult for the Ranger to chase him without losing him entirely. The Ranger was very good and fast on his feet, so Delioron had no need to slow down for him.
Delioron ran across the street past the Prancing Pony and continued down the Market Street. He arrived in the Market Square, ran around the market to allow the Ranger to catch up and slipped into the Low Street. He ran below the gate and the banners hanging from several underpass bridges and turned left into a narrow alley and kept going until the street forked. He kept running straight past market stalls until Low Street turned into Ironmonger Street. He ran through another gate and headed his way towards a wooden gate to his left that led into a grassy courtyard.
There he stopped for a moment and looked over his shoulder until he saw the Ranger running though the Ironmonger Gate. Then he ran across the courtyard and turned from the corner to the right, where the courtyard ran into a dead end after only a few paces. Delioron pulled out his dagger and leaned his back on the wall near the corner and waited.
It was still early morning.
