Part 4

When their supper was finished, they thanked the landlord, said goodnight to his other guests, and took Melannen up the narrow, creaking stairs to his attic bedroom.

It was small but cosy, for the landlord’s wife had lit the fire, and made up the bed with a warm quilt, and had found a tiny nightshirt for the boy to wear. Eowyn asked her to fetch some hot water and—whilst Legolas sat beside the fire and amused them by making hand shadow puppets on the wall—she helped the elfling change out of his still-damp clothes (which she hung over a chair to dry), and wash his hands and face, and put on his nightshirt.

“Now,” she said, “into bed!” She pulled back the coverlet.

The elfling climbed in. “Where’s Niben?” he asked.

“Niben?”

“The toy rabbit, melmenya,” said Legolas, making a shadow-rabbit—which peered at the elfling, took fright, and scampered off.

Melannen laughed.

“Of course.” Eowyn opened up the child’s basket and rummaged through its contents. “Ah, here he is…” She turned, holding the toy up in the firelight, only to find that the elfling had already fallen into reverie.

“Oh…” Smiling, she laid Niben on his pillow. “He must have been so tired, Lassui,” she said, carefully arranging the quilt around his shoulders, and kissing his forehead. “Sleep tight,” she whispered.

Then she and Legolas, hand-in-hand, tip-toed from the room, quietly closing the door behind them.