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"Of course you can," Earendil assured her as Haradhel brought in some pancakes for them to eat for a quick breakfast. "There will be small things that you can carry, too."

Blankets and the like.

They ate quickly, and then headed outside, where the others had already gathered: Elrohir and Elberon were still preparing the wagons and the horses, River was bouncing around and packing her bags up on one of the wagons while Halmir and Arthael kept an eye on her; Alena was sitting atop one of the wagons with Shiloh in her arms as Elros helped prepare the horses; Aethos and Luk were talking over by the horses; Shiro was working away on his tablet; Kaito was looking through his bag; and Aric and Leilani were waiting patiently, already mounted on horses, with Remiel sitting in the front of Aric's saddle.

"Miyuki!" River squealed when she spotted her friend. She hopped down from the wagon and ran to hug her. "We're finally leaving! I'm so excited! I can't wait to see what we're going to see and what we're going to learn! Isn't this just great? I'm so excited!"

River giggled and let Miyuki go, petting Senka apologetically. "Sorry, Senka, I'm just so excited!" she squealed. "We're going on a trip! I've never left the ranch or the valley before, so it's really special for me! I know you've been all around the world, but it's new for me!"

Earendil chuckled. "Well, this will be new for us, too," he told her. "So we'll all discover it together, all right? You just calm down before you spook the horses, or else we won't have a trip at all."

River's eyes grew wide, and she calmed herself immediately.

Earendil nodded towards Elrohir. "You're going to have to ask your uncle," he told her. "I think he knows more about it than I do - though I would imagine you should probably put your bag with River's bags."

He held his hand out to Lin. "I'll take yours if you like, you can see if there's any horse in particular you'd prefer to ride."

"Exactly!" River beamed. "This one here!"

When they reached the wagon, she hopped up quickly and reached a hand down to help Miyuki up. Being elvish wagons, hooked up to elven bred horses, they were higher than regular wagons. "Maybe we can even ride together in the wagon sometimes!"

"Ask Grandmama to pass you things," River suggested, 'then you can pass them up to me and I can pack them into the wagon. How does that sound?"

They couldn't get into trouble that way, could they?

In the end, it took them about an hour to pack up all of the horses and wagons and get started. They set out in a southeasterly direction, heading towards the river that passed through the valley, but to a point where they would meet up with it outside of the valley itself. It would be a good guide for them to head south, as the first human city was about a week's journey along the river.

River was so full of energy, she wanted to walk at first, and she skipped alongside the wagon, keeping up easily.

Earendil was quite comfortable, sharing the saddle with Miyuki, and now that they were traveling, he remembered something he and Lin had commented on a while ago.

"Miyuki," he said, "do you have any stories you wanted to hear from Lady Alena? She knows an awful lot about history, and the creation of the races and so on."

Alene was driving one of the wagons, Shiloh in one hand and reins in the other, and she smiled at Miyuki warmly.

"I would be happy to tell you," she told her sincerely, her green eyes shining brightly. She thought for a moment, letting her mind drift back to the distant past. Then she began to speak.

First she explained about Eru, the One, and the Valar, who followed Eru's plan to create the world, Arda, and how the world had been created out of song. Everything was perfect, and rather than there being night and day, there was a state of perpetual twilight, with the world being lit by two trees: the Silver Tree, and the Gold Tree.

When the Valar had finished their work of creating the world as they had been told, Eru pronounced it fit to be lived upon, and out of the sea he called forth his first race: the elves. For this reason, the entire race was known as the Firstborn.

"Aldrich, whom you know as Aragost, was the first to be called forth," she concluded hours later. "For a while, he was the only one, but as time passed, more and more of us were called out, and Valdemar - whom you call Sir Valdemar - was the last of us. There was such a beauty to life then, to the world ... it is still beautiful, but not in the same way."

She looked around, and though it was indeed a wonderful world they lived in, with the river on one side and a forest of trees on the other, she couldn't help but think, This is the beauty of a destroyed world.