Troubled

Strider has lived in the wild long enough to know that taking omens from the weather is folly. Yet the dark sky to the West fills him with anxiety. Where is Gandalf? Why has he sent no word?

Back and forth across the Road Strider casts for some sign of the wizard’s passage. Others are out upon the hunt, he knows, and not all of them friendly. A thick mist shrouds the Barrowdowns and the wind carries keen cries to the edge of hearing.

Has he failed the ring-bearer, lost the wisest being in Middle-Earth, destroyed all hope of victory?

[for obsidianj, who wanted drabbles about Aragorn as Strider or Thorongil]