Chapter 9. Thorn: Leaving Home and Comfort Behind

The byre was dark and shadowy and so quiet that Bucca could hear the swish of the cow’s tail and shudder of a plough pony shaking off sleep. ‘Hullo!’ he called softly. ‘I am here to guide you!’

He heard a movement in the hay, just the slightest movement. It might have been a cat after a rat, but knowing what he knew, he rather doubted it.

 ‘There is no time to waste,’ he hissed. ‘They are coming!’

It is not Thulion, he heard, no more than an exhalation in the hay. Stay.

More rustling in the haypile, and a soldier emerged warily, sword at the ready. Behind him came a woman, blinking in the light of the shrouded lantern. She was plainly dressed, and her clothes had been neat and well-kept before they’d acquired the look of hard travel. The hair that showed from under its covering was silvering and her face had the softness of age and gentle living.

 'I told you stay,' the soldier grunted, though he'd lowered his sword on seeing Bucca. 

The woman examined Bucca from head to toe and nodded to herself. ‘It is one of the Little Folk,’ she called softly over her shoulder. The rustling increased, and several more women emerged, each bearing a small child, and older children clustered about their feet. Bucca was to shepherd this flock through the woods and wild hills, ahead of a slaughtering force?

One of the women stepped a little in front of the others. ‘Berenarth,’ she said. ‘Where is my husband?’

Bucca bowed before her. ‘He is in the smial, my lady,’ he said. ‘The healer is binding up his wounds, and soon he will join us.’ He thought to himself that the prince belonged, instead, in a bed, but if the prince and his aide were to be believed, soon all beds in the Marish would burn. The only safety was to hide in the wilds and hope to escape the notice of the Men passing through.

 ‘Gather your bundles,’ the older woman said, and the others did so, not that they had much to carry. It seemed they had escaped the City with the clothes they were wearing and little else.

 ‘Come along,’ Bucca said. ‘Dawn is at hand. We must move as swiftly as we may.’

The two older women in the group, servants from their dress yet the others obeyed them meekly, marshalled their forces and emerged from the byre just as a family of hobbits entered, carrying hastily-assembled bundles. They shied away from the Big Folk and ducked into the byre, where the farmer could be heard issuing orders to his sons to load the bundles on plough pony and cow. Younger sons opened the pens containing pigs, goats, wing-clipped ducks and chickens and shooed the animals out of their shelters and into the cold.

Before Berenarth came out of the smial, leaning on Thulion his aide and flanked by the Thorn and Rocco, the hobbit farmer and his family were already leading the pack-bearing animals from the byre. One plough pony remained, and Rocco swiftly moved to bridle him and lead him out of the byre.

 ‘Get on,’ Thorn said to the prince.

Berenarth tried to straighten in defiance, but pain marked his face and his hand pressed against his side. ‘The littlest ones ought to ride,’ he hissed.

 ‘Get on,’ Thorn repeated. ‘You’ll only slow us down if you try to walk, and we cannot carry you if your strength should fail.’

 ‘Get on,’ the other Man said flatly, and he and the unnamed soldier helped Berenarth onto the pony’s back.

The hobbits might have laughed in other circumstances. The prince certainly looked ridiculous, his legs hanging nearly to the ground.

 ‘He will hardly carry me,’ he gritted as the women clustered round the pony.

 ‘He’s sturdy,’ Thorn said. ‘Pulls a plough in better times.’ He looked up and around at the Big Folk surrounding them and gave a nod. ‘Come along.’

Thulion was giving swift instructions to the soldier, who had sheathed his sword, his face grim but determined. At last the aide fell silent, and the soldier bowed before the prince. 'We will hold the Bridge to the last man, my lord,' he said.

Berenarth nodded. 'I know you will, my faithful guardsman,' he said. 'I shall see you again beyond the Seas, and lift a cup to you and your men.'

 'I pray you'll lift a cup here,' Thulion said, 'rather than There. In any event we must make haste.' The soldier bowed once more, turned, and began to jog towards the Road and the Bridge beyond.

Though it had dawned, the day was sullen and grey, heavy clouds threatening and a bite to the air. They caught a glimpse of the Great Road, still choked with refugees, before turning southwards, towards Stock and the road leading into The Yale, and the Woody End.

The Yale was quite a bustling little community of woodcutters set in the midst of a glade, for the trees of the Woody End marched farther than in later years. In point of fact, Shire-folk had not penetrated even half-way into the forest, but had settled around the edges of the wild country, in places like The Yale and Woodhall, Pincup and By-the-Water. Tuckborough and the Great Smials and the road that went all the way through the forest between Tuckborough and Stock were yet centuries in the future, and the father of the Tooks had fallen upon the North Downs.

 ‘We’ll be fine,’ Thorn told his son. ‘You run ahead and get everyone ready to travel.’

Bucca thought of his week-old son, and at the look on his face, Thorn patted his shoulder gently. ‘We’ll wrap the little ones well,’ he said quietly. ‘They’ll stand a better chance hiding in the woods where swords are less likely to find them.’

Bucca swallowed hard and nodded. His father had the truth of it, and saw clearly what they must do. It was why he was Thorn, leader of the Fallohides in the Marish, and why other Fallohides and even Stoors and Harfoots came to him for advice. He took a deep breath to set himself for the task ahead. His father would lead the family into hiding, and he would lead these Outlanders... and would he ever see his family again?

 ‘We’ll be ready to go by the time you reach the farm,’ he promised. ‘Stockbrook? Or Stock Road?’

His father squinted an eye at the sky. ‘ ‘Twill begin to snow again soon,’ he said. ‘Those clouds are too heavy to bear their burdens much farther. We’ll chance the road, at least until we reach the Yale, warn the hobbits there. Once in the wood it would be best to leave the road. No need to ease the task of pursuers.’

 ‘How will I find you?’ Bucca said, thinking too far ahead for comfort. He’d guide his charges to the Towers and return to the Woody End, and then...?

His father slapped him gently on the shoulder. ‘There is a tree,’ he said. ‘It is perhaps a quarter mile into the forest from The Yale. I’ll tell you how to find it, as we walk the road to The Yale. We’ll leave a watcher there, to watch for your return.’

Bucca nodded, reassured. Somehow knowing how to find his family on his return was all he needed to gather courage for the journey. ‘Right, then,’ he said, and with a quick bow to Berenarth he was on his way, running ahead over the snow to roust his family from their comfort and cast them into the snowy wild.