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"Something to eat?" Earendil smiled sheepishly. "I think I ended up missing dinner last night ... and if Miyuki will help me with my shirt, you can go ahead and take Andarien to Arthael before he starts crying. It's going to be a long enough day without waking everyone else up, if they're not up yet already."

He looked over at Miyuki, still sitting by the flap of the tent. "What do you say, Miyuki? Will you help me?"

Arthael was wrapped in her cloak and kneeling atop one of the wagons, looking through a crate for something. She looked up when Lin emerged from the tent with Andarien.

The moment they were in the open air, Andarien looked around, his eyes wide. In all their weeks of travel with him, this was the first rain that had fallen during his waking hours, and it was something that was new to him. He gasped as the raindrops spattered on his upturned face, his violet-blue eyes filled with wonder at it all.

Earendil took only a brief moment to think about it before he answered Miyuki's question. "Two: a long sleeved one and a short sleeved one. Maybe a white long-sleeved and a brown short-sleeved."

That would be fine, he figured.

Andarien squinted into the rain, coughing as a few drops fell into his wide-open mouth.

Arthael looked back at Lin when she called out to her, and called out in reply, "Good morning, Lin. I see Andarien is none the worse for wear. How is Earendil faring?"

Earendil chuckled at Miyuki's enthusiasm and nodded his approval. "Perfect!" he grinned at her. "Now I'm going to need your help in getting them on, all right? First the long-sleeved one, if you could open it up and hold it over my head so I can get my one arm in ..."

Arthael nodded. "He's a proud man," she replied. "It's really going to bother him, not being able to do everything he could before."

She pulled her hood a bit lower as the rain became stronger. "You'd best get Andarien out of this weather," she cautioned Lin. "Were you looking for me in particular? I doubt you left the tent just to wander with him."

Earendil slipped his good arm through the sleeve, then popped his head through the main hole. His other arm was a bit more trouble, though: he had to get Miyuki to hold the sleeve while he used his good arm to put his injured arm through it, gritting his teeth all the while. The pain was so intense that by the time he got his arm through, he was sweating slightly with the exertion of trying not to let it show.

"Now the other one," he said through clenched teeth, nodding at the over-tunic.

There was no point in stopping now. He might as well get it done and over with, and then he would be able to rest his injured arm and shoulder once more.

Arthael tilted her head thoughtfully, looking at Andarien and trying to judge his age.

"I wouldn't start him on solids just yet," she said finally. "Keep him on liquids for now, and once we have better supplies try something semi-solid, something mushy or something like that. Don't force it though. He's still young, he'll have to get used to it. As for food for the rest of you ..."

She picked up a small pouch and held it out to Lin. "Here. A bit of waybread. It's about all we've got that doesn't need to be prepared somehow. At least we've got plenty of it."

Earendil smiled gently at Miyuki, hiding his pain as well as he could, and murmured, "The cloak will just put pressure on my shoulder and make it hurt more. It should be fine, this shirt is short-sleeved so it will be much easier and faster to put on. Don't worry about me."

And once he had it on, he wouldn't bother taking it off until he absolutely had to. Better to do this once and get it done and over with than have to go through all of this again.

Arthael nodded again and pointed at one of the tents. "I think she and Elros are hunkered down in there," she told Lin. "Might be a bit crowded, I think Alassëa is staying in there with them for now."

Not to mention, Shiloh would need some space so that she wouldn't be sat upon either.

Sure enough, just as Earendil had said, putting on the short sleeved tunic was far easier than putting on the other shirt had been, and far less painful. Not that it didn't still hurt. Still, by the time it was on, he knew he was going to be warm without having to have a cloak on.

"I'll need your help to tie the strings," he told Miyuki with a helpless smile, using his good hand to fiddle with the strings at the neck of the tunic. "Not too tight, though, okay?"

Inside the tent, Alena was alone with Shiloh and the blind woman. Alena was feeding Shiloh at the side of the tent, while Alassëa was crouched at the back of it, playing with her falcon quietly. Her cloak was off now, and her staff also on the ground, and it was the first opportunity anyone had really had to get a good look at her. Despite her years in the swamp, her face was oddly pale, and her hair, before nothing but a tangled mess, now fell in gentle waves about halfway down her back. Her eyes were blue, despite a slightly glossy look that was the only indication that she was blind.

Alena had been watching Alassëa, but when Lin poked her head in she smiled at her. "Come on in," she invited her. "There's room. Elros is on duty right now."


"Thank you," Earendil said warmly once Miyuki had finished. He pulled the sling on again and ever so gently laid his injured arm in it so that it would be able to rest. "There. All set. Now we just need to wait for your mother so we can have something to eat."

Alena smiled at Lin. "Don't worry about it," she murmured. "I'm glad of the company. I know there are a lot of us here, but with all of us being in tents - or at least most of us, I'm not sure where Leyenda and Celeb and their families went - we're still not quite together enough to keep company. And let's face it."

She laughed softly. "Alassëa isn't exactly the conversational type."

She paused, then added, "On that note, we should probably speak in Common Elvish to see if it helps her."