Men, lacking stamina, would be asleep long since. (And as far as everyone else here knows, there are no longer any Maiar interested in taking corporeal form outside of Valinor.)

(She does a very convincing imitation of sleep while she thinks and plans and looks afar into the complexities of the Song of Creation, fortunately.)

Meanwhile, on the other side of at least one mountain and one river, a young girl plots a daring escape from her captivity of tyranny. Tyranny of captivity. Captivating tyranny. Tyrannous captivation. One of those. Anyway. No longer will she be held hostage to the whims of cruel and fickle minders, no longer will she languish in dreaded and boring hearthside labor instead of stalking through the forest and wresting adventure from the world with her own hands. Tonight, she is sneaking down to the stream, taking one of the boats, and setting off to wherever the current may take her. (This last clause being necessary because she has only a fairly slim idea how one manages a boat. But hey, how hard could it be? The others manage it, right?)

She's been stockpiling supplies gradually for a couple weeks now (and only had to push back her departure on account of accidentally eating into said supplies like twice), she's got her walking stick, her sling and bag of stones, and an extra shirt, just in case.

She successfully gets to the boat without getting caught!

The boat - a canoe, really - is long and thin and has a pretty clear area to sit, and she usually sees people using the paddles with it. 

It's a lot less still when she tries to get in than it looks when other people are doing this.

Surely through hard work and determination (and maybe a little bit of splashing) she can make it work.

...Well at least she doesn't sink?

She does get very slightly stuck in a shallow bit. Only really slightly. Though this time vigorous canoe wiggling isn't getting her out like it did last time.

Does paddle-pushing do the trick?

Wiiiigle shift -

No.

She might need to get out and push the canoe forward into deeper water.

Bleeehhhh. All right. Just gotta get the canoe loose without it running away from her. Easy.

...Well.

The rock ledge here is very slippery, and the current tumbling over it is pretty fast...

Ooooor she could pick the canoe up and put it back in where the water is friendlier. She can do that.

That makes her balance so much worse.

This is a very heavy canoe, in a way you kinda only notice when you're already starting to tilt precariously.

Aaaahhhh!!

At least slick river rocks hurt less when you fall on them than normal rocks.

Ow.

Chalk that one up to a learning experience. Or something.

At least the canoe doesn't get very far.

Still out of her reach, though.

No way she's giving up here. After it!

There is so much splashing.

But, several bruises, another soaking, some overheating, and some moments that would maybe be embarrassing if anyone saw which they didn't, she has - and is even back in - her canoe.

Call that a success. Alaudala settles back in to the journey, already mentally making edits to the story to either skip over it or make herself look better depending on the audience.

Things go smoothly from there.

Until the rapids, that is.

(Alaudala is going to build up a lot of interesting story, at this rate.)

She did plan on adventure...

And the river has obliged! Such a helpful river.

It is a very good river. Alaudala might even sing a little song about it, as the sun starts to rise.

The musical rush of water over rocks provides a very lovely accompaniment, and the river politely lets her come aground at a perfect camping place.

Heeee.

Yeah, this is how she's gonna start the story...