I’m telling you, that new King of ours is mighty strange.  Very lordly at the banquets, or so the serving lasses tell me, but you wouldn’t believe what I saw the other night!

What?  No, I wasn’t drinking!  What kind of a cook would I be if I was?  Wine dulls the palate, and the mind!  No, I really did see this, by the White Tree!

Well, I do realize now it was in part my fault.  The pheriannath love food, you see, so I let one of them into the kitchen once, and he asked where that door led, and I told him.  Meaning no harm, of course, and no harm was done of it, but that’s how he found out about the tunnels that the servants and workers use on occasion, when they need to get somewhere fast and out of the lords’ and ladies’ ways.

And he must have gotten in there when my back was turned, and found the other entrances, because otherwise I’m not sure how this would have worked.

And yes, I do hope it was the pherian’s idea, and not the King’s, because—heavens!  How could a King come up with an idea like that and still have time to be King?

So the pherian comes in a week later, with the King in tow, insisting that he’s found some sort of lost treasure and His Highness must see it himself, which made me wonder, but the King trusts the lad and all and I confess I rather trust him as well, so I didn’t think harm would come of it, and oh! would I come to regret that!

No, this one wasn’t the Ringbearer, otherwise I’d have thought nothing of it!  Sometime later two more pheriain come in—no, not the Ringbearer—and say they can’t find their friend, but they know he was muttering something about the hidden passages and treasure, and could they take some of the potboys, split up, and see if they could find them?  And they’re heroes, so of course I said yes, but I confess I was a little concerned at the loss of my potboys.

I don’t know how they managed this without being spotted by any one of us, but maybe the Powers were with them.  They must have been!

An hour passes, and who should show up here but the Lord Faramir!  He demands to know where the King is, hears I might know something about it, and says he’s needed immediately and every last one of us must go into the passages to find them.  So I banked the fires, and hoped desperately that no one would come needing my skills, and we must have scoured the passages, every last one of us.

We must have looked for another hour still, and then through the main hallways besides.  I don’t know what half the lords must have thought as we walked through—deferential as we could manage, but I couldn’t hide my nervousness.  The Lord Faramir is kind, so I don’t think he would send me home, but I might no longer be head cook if the King disappeared on my watch, through my door!

It was nigh on the tenth bell when we finally returned to the kitchen.

And who should be there but all four pheriain and the King himself, with a wonderful spread prepared.  For all of us!  He commended us on staying through and continuing to cook for the defenders during the whole siege—as if we’d ever asked for recognition!—and that the Halflings had all cooked while we were looking for them, since they said I’d never have let them if I was there.  Then he invited us to eat.

Now, I don’t know if they did anything differently because the stoves were twice their size, but the pheriain cooked very well, I think.  Their food was not nearly as well-flavored as mine, but it let the simplicity of the food itself shine through.  I think I rather like it, though it’s not good enough for court—not yet.

And after it was all done, his highness asked if I could make a meal—a court meal—for the other servants, and serve it to them first.

So you see why I said the Powers must have been working for them, and the King mustn’t have come up with the idea.  But he went along with it—he and the Lord Faramir too, for that matter!

Uncommonly kind, but mighty strange!