It was less than an hour until dinner time when I made it back to Uncle Oruc's and Aunt Monria's house. I turned my horse over to the stable master, Gerson, and went in through the back entrance of the house. The servants were in a veritable uproar scrambling through preparations for dinner, so I was able to make my way unnoticed through the hallway and up the stairs to my room.

Oh, I remembered. Uncle Oruc and Aunt Monria were having guests tonight. I had best make a good impression when I went to dinner, as befitted Havenwing's newest school teacher.

A single road plowed through the village. This road carried news, letters, gossip, friends, family, and—at least that day—two wanderers. One was older than the other, and they kept to the side of the road as they passed through, neither going further in nor wholly leaving it.
The older man was a middling person: middling height and build, plain, middling sort of features, and probably middle-aged. He attracted no attention, but the younger stood out.

It all started when mom and I were driving to a Pro-Life meeting. Mom asked me to read to her the Council of Elrond from the “Fellowship of the Ring” by J.R.R Tolkien. I read to her for probably forty out of the forty-five minute drive to a friend’s house. After we stopped there, we were off again for another thirty minute drive.