The next morning we got up early again. At least I assume it was early since I couldn’t see the sun when I woke up. This may have been partially affected by still wearing a blindfold over my eyes, but I chose to be ignorant and ignore this.
We ate a small breakfast of what we had between the elves and all of us. Katy and I were still tired when we started off, so we were quiet and irritable.
We had already walked for about an hour before I said anything, and hour being approximately how long it took me to wake up that morning. Earlier I had been too tired to even stay on my feet too long, the elves had to continuously help me up as I stumbled down the path. "How much longer until we reach the city?" I asked Haldir, I couldn’t wait to relax in Lothlorien.
"We will see." He helpfully informed me.
I groaned, "So what, seven, eight more hours?" I asked.
"No, about half that time I would estimate… If you can stop tripping and holding us back." Haldir smirked and the other elves laughed.
I glared at him (well, sort of, you know what I mean), "If you had let me get any sleep this morning, I wouldn’t be tripping!"
"Yeah!" Katy said picking herself off the ground again, "Or if we could ride a horse or on a carriage or something."
"Early to bed, early to rise. That’s what my gaffer always says! You two can’t do either!" Sam told us.
"Sam, what did I tell you about your gaffer?" I asked annoyed, "I have a saying too, late to bed and late to rise… And that’s the way I like it." I smiled, thinking about how I used to be able to sleep in on Saturdays… Then I grimaced remembering there was little chance of that here.
"You’re hopeless." Sam moaned.
"’you are hopeless’, Sam." Merry corrected.
"Thank you, Merry!" I exclaimed, "Finally someone agrees with me!"
Merry thought about that, then cracked up laughing realizing what he had just said. Pippin and Katy who had also overheard were laughing too, as well as Legolas and some other elves.
Sam looked indignant, "Hey, that is not very nice!" He exclaimed, quickly going red. Causing the elves to laugh more. As for the rest of us well, we didn’t see him.
Katy and I laughed over this for a while trying to decide who had been laughing the loudest about it. We finally bored of this however, coming to the conclusion it was one of Haldir’s friends whom we did not know the name of.
"Are we almost there?" I complained again.
"No, we are not almost there." Haldir told me.
"Are you sure? We’ve been walking a long time." I asked again.
"Yes, I am sure." Haldir affirmed.
"Positive?" Katy asked.
"Yes." Haldir answered, his patience growing thin.
"Maybe you’re holding the map upside down." I told him, "Turn it right side up," I advised him, "now are we almost there?"
"Fine," Haldir relented, "We’re almost there!"
"Really?" I asked, then said to Katy, "I knew he had the map upside down the whole time."
"So when will we be there?" Katy asked a few minutes later.
"It will take about four hours more." Haldir replied
"FOUR HOURS??!!" I blanched.
Katy was equally surprised, "FOUR HOURS??!!" She too blanched at nearly the same time.
"But that’s how long you said it would take before, and that was hours ago!" I complained.
Haldir rolled his eyes, a gesture made useless since we were STILL blindfolded, "Who is leading you?" He asked not waiting for us to answer, "Yes, it will take four hours. Now stop pestering me or I will take us the long way." Haldir told us.
"Four more hours and it isn’t the long way??" I asked, shocked.
"Yes. Four more hours. That is what I said. And you are about five seconds away from path that is twice as long." Haldir warned.
My eyes widened but I didn’t say anything. If I could see where the elf was, I would have glared at him, but NOOO, we had to be blindfolded!
Just wait until we had these blindfolds off. I’d show him… Well maybe not. But I could try! Or have Aragorn do it for me…
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