While everyone was busy in the camp, or watching the unconscious chieftain of the human village, Laurelindo sat against a tree trunk and took out of his bag parchment, quill and a small, half-emptied, bottle of ink.
He began to write quickly and illegibly a few music notes on the blank page, but soon settled for writing an account of the past night, as it was fresh in his mind and he was not in the mood for music.
The past night was the seventh night since we left Imladris. It was for us a busy night.
First, there was the meeting at the camp to decide what we were going to do. We needed more information and maybe the humans in the village of shepherds nearby could enlighten us. I think that everyone but me had something to say, in favor of either going to the village stealthily, ignoring the village, going to them directly, and so on.
Of course, I had my own idea on what to do about the shepherd tribe, on how to approach them, but there was no point in offering my opinion on the matter. There was really no reason for me to share this idea as I could point myself the weaknesses of my own plan :
-First of all, I was counting on the fact that the men had never seen any elves, like Elranthandor suggested. I knew that their people had been in a war with our House a few weeks before, but then, we only faced warriors, and I doubted that a village of shepherds had been invited to join the army of soldiers or mercenaries who faced us. At most, they may have been warned against elves. Maybe heard rumors of our supposed cruelty.
But that was only a supposition, what if I was wrong ?
-Second, there was the fact that lord Veryacano suggested buying one of the guards of the village to draw their chieftain out. If we could buy one to betray his people, considering the supposed honor of these men, it'd be easier to just buy the information we are seeking. Then again, it was counting of the fact that it was even possible to buy a suspicious information, and was it even possible to believe any information these men were volunteering, even against gold, food or animals ?
-The third problem was... Even if we could buy the information, how to make sure that it was not a trap, that they would not care who was asking and that they would not send a messenger to warn a largest force of warriors of our presence in this area ?
-And the final fault in this plan, as someone noted, there were women and children in that village, if the men there were not willing to trade information against goods, there was always the possibility that they'd attack and that the elves sent to try and talk to them would be forced to defend themselves, which in turn could cause harm to innocents, or cause deaths in our community. Which was by far the least desirable outcome.
However, the idea that we could just enter the village in the secrecy of night, kill a few guards and kidnap their chieftain was not to my liking. We didn't even know if this village had any information useful for us. I could kill of a good reason. Killing for the idea that IF we were right we would find some useful information... It was a completely different question.
Though, as the majority of our group agreed to this plan I had indeed a good reason to go, so when lord Veryacano asked if everyone agreed to it, I had nothing to say. I suppose he noticed my doubts though.
Some noise at the riverbed distracted Laurelindo from his writing for a little while. He finally looked back at his parchment and went back to his account of the night.
We had to cross the river and hide behind a large rock formation to get closer to the village, we killed a few guards while lord Veryacano entered the village with Belegos. I stayed with the others at the rock at the edge of the village.
There was more dead than I thought there would be among the humans guarding the village.
Lord Veryacano and Belegos came back quickly enough with the unconscious and apparently heavy chieftain of the tribe. We went back on the other side of the river, the bodies left behind, more or less well hidden. Some of them abandoned inside the village.
When lord Veryacano asked about them, he decided that we had to return to get them and hide them better. He seemed really annoyed at the fact some bodies were left behind.
Dawn was beginning to appear already, and we didn't have time to bury the bodies in place so we took them with us to bury them on our way back to the camp, though, maybe we should have just pushed them in the river. It would have taken them far away enough by the time the rest of the village woke up.
And now here we are, back in the camp, waiting to talk to the chieftain of the human village. We just have to hope that we are finished with him and long gone or hidden enough that the men of the village could not find us even if they were looking for us.
Laurelindo stopped writing, looking instead at the river, and watching the others. Finally he put the parchment and quill back in his bag and stretched, wondering if he'd be able to get his writings to Imladris anytime soon. If not, he would have to rethink about keeping an account of everything.
