Bree burning
A tale freshly told of the Erebor
Late night at the Bree summer faire is disturbed by a blaze in the distance.
Bree Fair Tent(#31403SVe)
Flags are flying from every available pole. A great red and white striped tent is stretched over a grassy area - the sides are looped up because of the heat. Inside the tent are several tables of wares and one (where many men are clustered) set in front of a large stack of ale-barrels. Several of Barliman Butterbur\'s strongest men are there, hefting the barrels back and forth and drawing out drinks for those who wish.
A greased pole is nearby - a large bag is balanced atop it. Inviting, isn\'t it? To see if you can climb to the top without sliding down again.
Acrobats and tumblers turn somersaults through the fair grounds, and a band has been set up nearby. The music is cheerful and bouncy, and already a boy and girl are dancing to it.
Carrying:
Rhifaroth
Acelen
Fornathan
Prudence
Caleb
Greased Pole
Pig-Lifting Corner(#29155Vz)
Candy Stall
Alefest Sampling Table
Bree Fair Tent(#31403SVe)
You are standing in a large red and white striped canvas structure held up by stout logs and partially open at the sides. The guy-wires that keep the canvas taut have been strung with small triangular flags that wave gaily in the wind.
Several rows of rough plank tables are lined along both sides with an anvenue in the middle. At the far end is a large bar and Two brick ovens.
Type +Menu
Contents:
Rhifaroth
Acelen
Fornathan
Prudence
Caleb
Greased Pole
Pig-Lifting Corner(#29155Vz)
Candy Stall
Alefest Sampling Table
[Rhifaroth(#27282)]
The taller man with the long bow now in hand comes as Acelen grabs his arm and hauls on him. But Rhifaroth\'s bad left leg, which he drags a bit, may draw Acelen off balance as the Dunadan tries to keep his own feet.
\"Easy there, I\'m coming, Acelen.\" his own baritone makes a soft reply, grey eyes watching that distant light and already knowing what it is, though he says not.
Disengaging his arm from the stablemaster\'s grip, the tattooed man gives his old aquaintence a careful look, \"You might do better to go back to the stable with haste and get yourself mounted, friend. Elfaron won\'t spook at fire as easily as some.\" He suggests.
Prudence lifts on her toes while walking, then nudges around and through the crowd. Finally she is to the edge of the tent, staring with mouth open up at the flames. \"Is that a house? Is that...?\"
The woman grips her skirt in both hands and begins running into the darkness toward the distant fire.
[Acelen(#32035)]
Acelen looks up at the taller man, and now his eyes are filled with fear. \"There\'s more n\' one fire,\" he says urgently. \"Those are houses on the outskirts of Bree. I could understand one of em lighting on fire from an uncleaned chimney,\" he says, \"But I\'m afraid that more than one is something to worry about.\" As Prudends appears at the opening of the tent, he looks at her soberly. \"Isn\'t your house located over yonder?\" Rhifaroth\'s comment about the horse seems not to be notices by the stable master for the moment, but he does look in the direction of the guardhouse just down the path. \"We need to raise the alarm somehow regardless of the women and children,\" he says, \"or the houses will not be saved.\"
[Prudence(#30166)]
\"Yes,\" Prudence says breathlessly while running past Acelen into the shadows toward the fire.
[Frarin] Among the crowds of humans and hobbits there is another, shorter than the Tall folk and taller than the Short folk. Frarin the Dwarf seems beset by curious hobbit children, for an entourage of them goggle after him as he wades through the large tent. He walks still with a tall stick, but he does not lean heavily upon it, nor is he clad any longer in the robes of a resident of the town\'s Healing House. At his side is looped the familiar blue war hammer, but it is held to his belt by a length of string as a sign of faith while within Bree.
Frarin is unsmiling, though not unkind, as he moves through the crowd. He hunches forward still and uses his walking stick as a balance more than a support. For the time he seems only to be perusing the tent, yet unaware of the slight alarm raised over the distant fires, and attempting to shake his following of curious onlookers.
[Rhifaroth(#27282)]
Acelen\'s suggestion to at least raise the town Guard is sensible enough, at least outwardly. Rhifaroth nods to him, \"Do that then... I\'ll go.\" Catching sight of some fool woman dashing off into the darkness towards what she can\'t even imagine spurns the tall man to make haste.
\"Do it quietly! The Guard can also keep the drunks, children, and others here!\" For some reason, it might be that Rhifaroth isn\'t really interested in -too- many folk rushing off towards the fires blindly.
But, in a moment he is trying to jog off towards the north himself, his bad leg making his going less than graceful or fast.
Rhifaroth has left.
Acelen has left.
The Greenway Crossing
The Greenway Crossing stands as the meeting point for the Greenway and the Great East Road. The Greenway stretches north and south for many miles more than the eye can absorb, and the Great East Road continues to the west to the same degree. To the east, just beyond this juncture in fact, stands a gate. Because night has not yet arrived, the gate which heads east into the village of Bree stands wide open, inviting travellers and residents to enter at will.
Contents:
Acelen
Bree Fair Tent(#31403SVe)
Road Sign
Obvious exits:
South, East, North, and West
Northern Crossroads
Here the old North road, the so-called Greenway, runs along its overgrown track across a steadily rising land. In the north the concentric rings of the Downs are visible, away against the horizon, as a hazy grey ridge west lie open and barren lands, once the heartlands of lost Arthedain. Scattered copses of foliage dot the landscape there.
In the east, as the land falls gently away, the plain fades into the reedland and fen of the vast Midgewater Marshes, dank and desolate. Beyond them the Weather Hills are a distant shadow on the edge of sight. Southwards is Bree that settlement\'s eponymous Hill is clearly visible.
Obvious exits:
Northwest leads to Hillside.
Southeast leads to Outside North Gate.
North leads to Road through the North Downs.
East leads to Barren Country: Near the Bree-lands.
South leads to North Downs Road.
Upslope lies grazing country...
Hillside
The land rises into beautiful green slopes, rolling and verdant. The ground is firm under the foot, and yet spongy. Old stone fences seem in ill repair here, fallen down in places.
The grasses seem to have grown unusually high of late, all new growth to judge by the pale green shoots. This is prime sheep country, and yet the only sign of habitation is a grim one: bleached bones, here and there, where a kill has been made.
Contents:
Prudence
Rhifaroth
Prudence\'s House(#26772Cn)
Obvious exits:
Southeast
Nob climbs upslope.
Nob has arrived.
Acelen climbs upslope.
Acelen has arrived.
[Acelen(#32035)] Acelen runs off to the guardhouse and soon a bell begins to ring urgently at the West Gate. In no time at all the murmur of voices from town - sleepy ones at that begin to be heard at the end of the path. Then there are shrieks of horror from some of the bystanders as they look north towards the flames.
[Prudence(#30166)]
On the hill, two houses are burning-- a larger one at the top and a smaller one further down. A great tree once grew between them, but it has toppled and fallen, flaming still, into the smaller house.
Prudence would, perhaps, be the very first person at the hill. She runs up the road as fast as she can-- which isn\'t very fast now, as she seems to have a stitch in her side. She presses a hand there while huffing.
Finally she stops at the base of the hill. She stares upward, flames reflected in her eyes, her mouth hanging open.
[Rhifaroth(#27282)]
Two homes here up on the hill\'s slope are a blaze brightly against the night. There are already a few folk running about, confused and shouting.
Not nearly as fast as the paniced woman who raced off ahead of him, Rhifaroth struggles to come as quickly as he may, but more wary of the darkness than paying attention to the burning buildings. Bow in hand, he limps, almost dragging his left leg and still muttering, \"Where is Giliath?\"
A tattooed hand draws out one of the few arrows he has managed to finish fletching and lays it to the as yet unfamiliar long bow. The tall man comes to a stop, not trying to go any further up the slope, and pauses to get his breath, looking with caution, tring to pick out figures in the darkness and mark them for Breefolk or ... something else.
Giliath climbs upslope.
Giliath has arrived.
[Acelen(#32035)]
There is a thunder of hooves as Acelen comes barreling down the road riding Elfaron. Behind him can be heard the voices of a crowd of people making their way along the road.
In the darkness, the stable master cannot see where Rhifaroth and Prudence might have gone. He shields his eyes from the flames and regards the burning houses from a spot that is probably too close for comfort.
[Frarin] Still moving idly through the faire gathering, Frarin turns as the giggles of several hobbit children calls his attention. The dwarf gives them a sympathetic smile and his lips part to say something, but just then a familiar figure catches his attention and Frarin lifts his gaze from the young hobbits, apparently surprised to see Rhifaroth still in Bree. There is no time to question, however, for soon a woman darts out of the tent with a look of concern and the man from the south follows after, then another man that Frarin does not recognise.
A similar look of concern crosses the dwarf\'s face, dark eyes alert suddenly to the disturbance. Without a word to his eager entourage, Frarin takes up his walking stick and hobbles as quickly from the tent as his hunched posture allows.
Soon his short, broad shape is stumping up the hill towards the two blazes, moving with slowly but steadily with laboured breathing. As of yet, he is only a small shape in the darkness of night, though the light of the distance flames vaguely brightens his shadowed face and reveals the long dark beard wagging at his waist.
[Giliath(#9838)] And, lo and behold, from the darkness and swirling panic, the elf appears. He takes in the situation in a glance, running up the hill towards the flames. He shouts something... an unfamiliar, liquid, lilting word then says it again in Common, \"Is there any within?\"
[Prudence(#30166)] \"Put it out!\" Prudence\'s voice finally comes. She is pointing to the house further down the hill. Her face shines and she walks quickly closer to it, eyes only to the fire. \"Please? Please?\" Her cry has a note of helplessness to it, hopeless begging. \"Someone help?\"
[Rhifaroth(#27282)]
Perhaps his concern that there must be orcs about has clouded any thought that there might be innocent folk trapped in those burning homes. Rhifaroth hears a familiar lilting voice and what it shouts. He turns and looks around in the darkness, light by the flames, and thinks he catches sight of Giliath. There is also a horseman just arrived, possibly Acelen as the horse looked to be a grey.
But there is no time for that. Finally coming up the hill the last way, bow still in hand and a wary eye for the still dark land around them, Rhifaroth draws near to Prudence, raising his voice to shout at her over the sound of the burning buildings, \"Do you know these homes? We need to account for folk - and any children!\"
[Acelen(#32035)]
Acelen circles the horse helplessly around the flaming buildings. There is no way to get in now that the flames have caught so deep a hold - and it is certain that anything caught within must surely have perished.
Now, others have arrived and they too look on helplessly for there is no chance that a bucket brigade would have any effect.
Acelen begins to walk the horse around, searching for Prudence and Rhifaroth. In the light of the fire, something catches his eye and he dismounts.
[Prudence(#30166)] \"My house.\" Prudence is ignoring the bigger house and is focusing on the smaller. A bit of the roof falls in and sparks shoot up into the air, yellow. \"Jes was with me, mam...\" The woman starts to cry. \"I don\'t know wh-where our mam is.\" Her fists twist her skirt.
[Giliath(#9838)] Words come through the roaring of the flames, and Giliath turns unerringly towards Prudence and Rhifaroth. \"Your... \'mam\'?\" he asks, voice urgent. \"You think she may be inside?\"
[Frarin] The cause of the alarm becomes ever clearer as Frarin nears the top of the hill, now using the walking stick as a support as he climbs the slope. As he comes near to the blazes, his beard rises and falls atop the heavy breaths of his chest, which begin to slow with the exertion at an end. A cough rumbles up from his chest as smoke blankets the air.
But the dwarf takes only a second to regain his breath. As he takes in the double blazes, his jaw tightens and his eyes narrow. Into his beard erupts an angry curse, a few muttered words audible to none but those nearest him, but they are harsh and strange, as if of a language other than the common tongue.
Frarin\'s hand goes to the string-bound hammer at his side, but he leaves the search for survivors or trapped occupants to the Breelanders. The dwarf quietly stumps towards the north, dark gaze prodding the darker night.
[Rhifaroth(#27282)]
Acelen\'s assessement is his own as well, that the fires are too far along to be put out and likely also too far along for hope of survivors if anyone was trapped inside. But Rhifaroth had to ask, and if need be he puts out a restraining hand to the upset woman, \"If you have kinfolk missing, leave the burning... so seek them, lass. Ask after them. Others may know.\"
Giliath coming up to them catches his own eye. Rhifaroth inclines his head towards his friend in silent greeting, not making any further question himself lest the woman\'s reply to the elf be lost in the roaring flames. Even standing here, they are too close. He tries to draw the woman back gently but firmly.
[Prudence(#30166)] \"Mam. Mother.\" Prudence\'s tears reflect the flames and she moves to walk still closer to the house, only to be stopped by RHifaroth\'s hand. She pulls at her hair now, pins sliding out. \"I don\'t know if she was at home or not!\"
[Acelen(#32035)]
The object that has caught the Stable Master\'s eye glints dully in the churned up earth around the houses. He bends to touch a print made in the earth and then frowns. \"Never seen nothin like o this,\" he mutters and then refocuses on the glinting object that first made him dismount. It is an arrow head, rough and barbed, broken in two. He shuffles his feet around in the dirt and finds the other half which sports a bedraggled black tuft of arrows. \"Same as before,\" he says in wonder as he holds it up for inspection.
[Giliath(#9838)] \"Your mother,\" Giliath repeats, and he is gone. Closer to the fire than he should be, he circles the burning structure. His figure turns black against the flames, and the outline can be seen moving away, slapping now and then at his body, vanishing and then reappearing on the other side. He returns to where Rhifaroth restrains the weeping woman his clothing smoking a little from places embers have charred holes in the weave. Oddly, the holes are smaller than they might be. His hair is singed.
\"I heard no one,\" he says tersely, and his eyes meet Rhifaroth\'s. \"She is .. not there,\" he tells Prudence gently and she is note - either because she is dead and thus no longer inhabiting her body, or because she has gone elsewhere before the fire began.
His dark eyes go to the second house, then back to the first, and to the land around them. \"Is there water near?\" he asks. \"A ... well?\"
[Frarin] Wandering still further up the hill from the small house, Frarin digs the bottom end of his walk stick into the ground before him, labouring to reach the larger of the two burning houses. Like the smaller building, this higher one is beyond recovery, but it does not seem recovery that the dwarf is intent upon.
Pace still slow, but doggedly steady, Frarin circles around to the north side of the second house. The golden orange of the blaze lights the slick of sweat on his rugged face and dances across the fresh green tunic he wears. He gingerly lowers himself to a kneeling position, keeping his back as straight as possible and leaning heavily on the walking stick. Silently, glancing up at the fire occasionally, the dwarf seems to study the deep shadows that the flames throw across the ground.
[Acelen(#32035)]
Acelen rises, the broken arrow held in front of him. \"Smells the same as the others,\" he says to himself. He pulls the horse closer and remounts, circling the burning houses and looking for Rhifaroth. The horse suddenly shies sideways as the wall in the house collapses beside him and he is showered with sparks.
Losing no more time, he moves the horse a safe distance away and begins to watch carefully for the horse\'s owner.
[Prudence(#30166)] \"N-not there?\" Prudence repeats in a wobbly voice. She sniffs and rubs the heels of her hands into her face. \"Thank you, mister elf.\" She drops from beneath Rhifaroth\'s hand to kneel on the ground, hands still covering her face. Her body gives a quick shake now and then, quiet evidence of her tears.
Caleb climbs upslope.
Caleb has arrived.
[<#27282>]
Restraining the frightened almost senseless woman yes, and continuing to draw her back as well as the fire rages rapidly on and the building may soon threaten colapse. Rhifaroth\'s grip is firm and hard upon Prudence\'s arm even though he does not know the woman. He raises his voice to shout something back towards the elf, \"
It is then that Rhifaroth notices Acelen dismounted and holding something he has picked up from the ground. His cloak\'s hood having fallen back when he had tried to run before, he sees that man remount and wheel Elfaron further out even as a wall gives in - and showers them all with a wave of heat and sparks as well, \'GET BACK!\' He throws up his free arm against the rush, trying to drag that woman back and not let her kneel now!
[Acelen(#32035)]
\"Prudence! Rhifaroth!\" the stablemaster cries, though now there is so much noise it may be unlikely that anyone could hear him.
[Giliath(#9838)] Giliath catches the sound of Rhifaroth\'s name shouted through the roaring flames, and he glances towards Acelen, before taking the waterskin with a crooked smile, and dousing his upper body. \"It was a trifle warm,\" he explains, still in common, though the other speaks Sindarin. Then the wall collapses and the elf gives over speaking. He stoops, lifting Prudence as if she is a baby, and grabs Rhifaroth in the same motion, pulling him back and away from the flames faster than the man could limp. Setting the woman down, letting go of the man, he whirls and leaps towards Acelen, to push the man over and roll him on the ground. Flames leap up at the stablemaster\'s back.
Prudence is tugged upward by Rhifaroth, but a moment later there is a shower of light and she finds herself lifted in the air. She barely gets a glance at Giliath before she is set down again. She opens and shuts her mouth, eyes glued again to her home as it starts to collapse.
[Frarin] In the flickering light of the larger house, Frarin\'s form can be seen rising once more and, after a moment\'s longer inspection of the churned earth, his walking stick frustratingly stabs the ground. The roar of flames brings the dwarf\'s attention back to the burning buildings and he catches sight of the smaller house collapsing just as a wall of the larger house tumbles inward in a shower of sparks.
With a last glare towards the blackness beyond to the north, Frarin begins to labour down the hill again, satisfied for the moment, it would seem, that the greatest danger is fire.
[Giliath(#9838)] The man yet lives, and Giliath is gone as soon as he sees him out of danger. His form vanishes into the night around the houses - scouting, perhaps to be sure nothing - or no /one/ - lurks there, waiting to prey on the unwary and weak.
Prudence at last starts to stand, pushing fists into the ground. She turns and walks back to the crowd of bystanders, her voice raising. \"Jeeeees?\" she calls as she walks away. \"Jeeees?\"
[Rhifaroth(#27282)]
Plenty of sparks and heat. And good thing that elven reflexes are so fast! Rhifaroth might not have kept his feet himself if not for Giliath\'s quick action to help push them back.
Looking to Prudence to see if she\'s hurt, the tattooed man now urges her towards town even as she gets back up and turns away from him.
If Rhifaroth might have said something to Giliath, it goes unsaid for the elf has slipped off into the darkness - likely to do that tracking he mentioned. Limping to gain a bit more distance from the fires himself, teh man looks around to try and see where Acelen has gotten off to in the confusion.
[Acelen(#32035)]
\"What th\"?!\" Acelen says as he is rolled unceremoniously off the horse to the ground. It is only then that he feels the heat of the fire through his clothes and realizes that he was actually on fire! He rises slowly, patting the dust from his clothes and then a perplexed look comes over his face. \"Now where did that go?\" he says to no one in particular.
[Frarin] Down the hill Frarin comes slowly, his left hand, arm no longer held in a sling, gently clutching the ribs just below his chest. Still breathing heavily, the dwarf pauses as he comes again to the smaller house, now a flaming ruin. The flickering yellow light creates shadows beneath his eyes and about his mouth and give him a drawn, haggard look. And yet still he says naught.
A glance is spared for the limping Rhifaroth, but then Frarin departs, keeping his silence. Down the hill he continues, following the path after the distraught Prudence. But a keen light there is in the dwarf\'s eyes - of concern? hopelessness? rage? - that does not fade as he descends from the hilltop and is slowly swallowed up by the night.